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FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY 



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“ ‘ THERE WAS A LITTLE BLACK SHAPE SITTING ON 

11 


SOME LUGGAGE 



Friendship and Folly 


& Nobel 


, 

BY 

MARIA LOUISE POOL 

ii 

AUTHOR OF 

“IN A DIKE SHANTY,” “BOSS,” ETC. 



BOSTON 

L. C. PAGE AND COMPANY 

(incorporated) 

1898 


• 


14030 


Copyright, 1898 

By The J. B. Lippincott Co. 
Copyright, 1898 

By L. C. Page and Company 

(incorporated) 





TWO vOi UvS RcCtlVED* 



Colonial ^rtss 

Electrotyped and Printed by C. H. Simonds & Co. 
Boston, U.S. A. 



1898 . 


CONTENTS, 


CHAPTER 

I. 

II. 

III. 

IV. 

V. 

VI. 

VII. 

VIII. 

IX. 

X. 

XI. 

XII. 

XIII. 

xiv. 

XV. 

XVI. 

XVII. 

XVIII. 

XIX. 


At Savin Hill 15 

A Slight Accident 43 

“ I Want to Ask You a Question ” . 59 

“ I Really Ought to Have Been an 

Actress ” 84 

Being a Chaperon 101 

The Evening Before 114 

“A Blessed Chance” . . . .128 

On Board the Scythia . . . .140 

“ Cold Porridge Hot Again ” . . .150 

The Passenger List 169 

A Knock-down Blow 178 

“Don’t Be Cruel to Me” . . . 186 

An Involuntary Bath .... 205 

A Bull Terrier *216 

“ Too Much for Any Woman to Forgive” 230 

T£te- A - T£te 251 

“Are you Going to Marry Lord Max- 
well?” 261 

Leander as a means 274 

“I Shall Come Back” .... 289 












































































































































































































































































































































































































































FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


CHAPTER I. 

AT SAVIN HILL. 

There was one large wicker chair on the piazza, 
and in the chair sat a girl. It was a spacious piazza, 
the roof of which was supported by gnarled tree- 
trunks, the bark and the knots carefully preserved 
so as to look “ rustic.” The deep eaves drooped in 
a rustic manner also, and there were trumpet-vines 
and wistaria, and various other creeping things of 
the vegetable world, wandering about in a careful 
carelessness, like the hair of a woman when it is 
dressed most effectively. 

The lawn swept down rather steeply and stopped 
suddenly against a thick stone wall that was covered 
with ivy. 

On top of this wall, ruthlessly trampling back and 
15 


1 6 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

forth on the leaves, was a small boy dressed in the 
fashion of a member of the navy. His blue panta- 
loons flapped very widely at the ankles, and were 
belted about him by a leather belt on which was the 
word “Vireo,” in gilt letters ; his brimless cap was 
tipped perilously on that part of his head where the 
warm affections used to be located in the days of 
phrenology. On this cap also appeared the word 
“ Vireo,” in gilt. This figure, outlined as it was 
against the bright blue of the sky, had the effect of 
not being more than about sixteen inches long. And 
in truth Leander Ffolliott was very small for his age, 
which was ten years and five months. He did not 
feel small, however ; his mind might suitably have 
inhabited a giant’s frame, so far as his estimation of 
himself and the Ffolliott family generally was con- 
cerned. But the rest of the family did not always 
agree with him in this estimation, and at such times 
of disagreement the boy was given to screaming and 
kicking until the air round about this summer resi- 
dence resounded, and seemed actually to crackle and 
glimmer in sympathy with the mood of Leander. 

Just now he had stopped in his trampling of the ivy 
leaves. He was standing with his legs wide apart, 
and was bending forward somewhat, stirring with a 
stick something on the top of the wall in front of 


AT SA VIN HILL. 1 7 

him. His atom of a face was screwed up, his lips 
sticking out. 

“ Sis ! ” he suddenly shrieked ; “ I say, sis ! ” 

The girl on the piazza stopped reading, and looked 
at the boy. 

“ What’s the matter ? ” she called out. 

“ You just come here ; you come here this minute ! 
Stop readin’ that nasty book, ’n’ come along ! ” 

“ Carolyn, you’d better go,” said a voice from the 
inner side of an open window ; “ if you don’t he may 
be so tried with you that he’ll fall off the wall. I’ve 
told him not to get on that wall, anyway.” 

The girl rose and turned her book down open upon 
her chair. Then she sauntered slowly along over 
the lawn, so slowly that her brother Leander stamped 
his foot and called to her to hurry, for he couldn’t 
wait. 

“ You’d better hurry, Carolyn,” said the gentle 
voice at the window ; “ I’m so afraid he may fall.” 

So the girl hastened, and in a moment was leaning 
against the wall and asking, without much interest : 

“ What is it, Lee ? You do shriek so ! ” 

Leander was now standing upright. He had put 
his foot, encased in yellow leather, hard down on the 
something he had been poking at. His freckled face 
was red, his eyes shining with excitement. 


1 8 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

“ By George ! ” he exclaimed ; “ you can’t guess in 
a million years what I’ve found ! No, not in ten 
million ! I ain’t picked it up yet. I wanted you to 
see me pick it up. Oh, thunderation ! won’t I just 
do what I darn please with the money ? You bet ! 
Fifty dollars ! Cousin Rod owes me fifty dollars ! 
I don’t s’pose he’ll be so mean as to say that ad. of 
his has run out ’n’ he don’t owe me anything. Do you 
think he’ll be so mean as that, Caro? Say ! ” 

At this thought Leander’s face actually grew pale 
beneath tan and freckles. 

The girl was not very much impressed as yet by 
her brother’s excitement. She was used to seeing 
him excited. 

“ You know Rod wouldn’t do anything mean,” she 
replied, calmly. “ But what are you talking about ? 
Of course it can’t be — ” 

“Yes, ’tis, too. And it’s fifty dollars. Now you 
needn’t go ’n’ tell Rod he no need to pay it, ’cause 
’twas one of the family. I won’t stand it if you do ! 
I — ” 

“ Stop your gabble !” interrupted the girl, impera- 
tively. “ Lift up your foot.” 

She took hold of the boy’s arm as she spoke. A 
certain spark had come into her eye. 

The foot was withdrawn. In a cleft between the 


AT SA VIN HILL. 


19 


stones, where the ivy leaves had hidden it, lay a ring. 
It was turned so that the stone could but just be 
seen. 

She extended her hand, but it was promptly 
twitched away by her brother. 

“None er that!” he cried. “I ain’t goin’ to let 
you pick it up ; then you’ll be wantin’ to share in the 
fifty dollars. You can’t do that, — not by a long 
streak. Here she goes ! ” 

He stooped and then held up a ring between his 
finger and thumb. The sun struck it, and made 
the engraved carbuncle shine dully red. 

“That’s the very critter!” exclaimed Leander, 
triumphantly. 

“ Let me take it,” said the girl. 

She spoke shortly, and in a way that made the 
boy turn and look at her curiously. But he obeyed 
instantly. He laid the ring in the palm of her hand, 
thrust his own hands into his pockets, and stood 
gazing down at his sister. 

Carolyn Ffolliott looked at the trinket with nar- 
rowing eyes. Her lips were a trifle compressed. 

“There ain’t any mistake, is there?” the boy 
asked, at last, speaking anxiously. “That’s the 
ring Rod lost, ain’t it ? Anyway, it’s one exactly 
like it, — that red stone with something cut into it.” 


20 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


“ There isn’t the least chance of any mistake,” 
was the answer. “ Of course it’s Rod’s.” 

Carolyn gave back the ring. 

“ And I sh’ll have the reward ? ” 

“ Of course.” 

The girl appeared to have lost all interest in the 
matter. She turned to go back to the piazza. 

Leander made an extremely tight, hard, dingy fist 
of one hand, with the ring enclosed, and then he 
leaped down from the wall, landing so near to his 
sister that she staggered away from him. 

“ I wish you would behave respectably ! ” she 
cried. 

“Pooh!” said Leander. He ranged up by her 
side and walked across the lawn with her towards 
the house. 

He had now put the ring on his thumb and was 
holding it up in front of him, gazing at it. He 
was greatly surprised that his sister took no more 
notice of it. But you never knew what to expect 
of a girl. Anyway, she shouldn’t have any of that 
money. - 

“ I’ll bet I know how the ring got there,” he 
remarked, presently. 

“How?” 

“Why, you gaby you, the crow, of course. But 


AT SA VIN HILL. 


21 


I don’t know how he got it. Flew into Rod’s room 
sometime, I s’pose. If he thinks such an almighty 
lot of it, Rod better look out. I guess fifty dollars ’d 
get a lunkin’ lot of cannon crackers, don’t you think, 
sis?” 

“Yes,” absently. 

“But I better have some pin-wheels, ’n’ Roman 
candles, don’t you think ? ” 

“ Yes.” 

Leander turned, and peered up at his sister’s face. 

“ You mad ’cause you didn’t find it ? ” he asked. 

“ No.” 

“ All right. I guess I’ll get you ’n’ marmer some 
kind of a present. I’ll make marmer tell me what 
she’d like for ’bout fifty cents. Hi ! marmer ! I’ll 
let you have three guesses ’bout what I’ve found — ” 

Here Leander slammed in through the wide 
screen door which opened from the piazza into 
the hall. 

Leander’ s sister resumed her seat. She had taken 
up her book, and now sat looking at it in much the 
same attitude that had been hers when her brother 
called her. She could hear his shrill voice inside the 
house, as he told his mother of his find. 

After a few moments Carolyn heard the clock in 
the hall strike ten. At about ten the mail for “ Savin 


22 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. \ 


Hill,” as their place was called, was brought over 
from the village. 

But she continued to look intently down at her 
book for several minutes more. Then she rose 
slowly ; she stood and gazed off across the lawn 
to where a sharp line of glitter showed between 
some savin-trees that had been left standing on the 
other side of the wall. These trees slanted south- 
westerly, as do most of the trees on the south shore 
of Massachusetts, being blown upon so much of their 
lives by the northeast wind. 

That line of glitter was Massachusetts Bay. 
Across the girl’s vision moved two or three sails ; 
but she did not seem to see them. Her eyes 
showed that she was not thinking of what was 
before her. 

Presently a clock somewhere in the house struck 
the half-hour after ten. 

A servant came out on the piazza with some 
papers and letters in her hand. She hesitated, then 
came forward. “ You told me to bring the mail out 
here, Miss Ffolliott,” she said, as if in apology. 

“ So I did ; thank you.” 

“Why, Carolyn!” exclaimed a middle-aged lady, 
hurrying by the servant, “ isn’t this odd about 
Rodney’s ring ? ” 


AT SAVIN HILL . 


23 


“ Very,” answered the girl. She held the papers 
in her hand and did not raise her eyes as she spoke. 

“ I do wonder what he’ll say,” went on her mother. 
“ I do wonder if he still cares. How upset he was ! 
And how curious that he should have lost the ring 
just before the engagement was broken ! It did 
seem almost like a forerunner.” 

Mrs. Ffolliott held the trinket in her hand. Her 
son was standing beside her still, with his hands in 
his pockets. He was watching the ring somewhat 
as he would have watched it if his mother had been 
likely to devour it. 

“You know Devil took it, of course,” answered 
Carolyn, without raising her eyes. “ There’s no 
other way to account for its being in the wall 
there.” 

“ It always seems so profane to speak of the crow 
in that way,” murmured Mrs. Ffolliott. 

Whereat her son frankly exclaimed, “ Oh, marmer, 
don’t be a jackass ! That’s the crow’s name, you 
know.” 

“ But he ought never to have been named in that 
way. I objected to it from the first.” 

“ Pooh ! ” — this from Leander. 

“ I know,” went on the lady, “that it was Rodney 
himself who named him, but — ” 


24 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


“ Come, now, marmer,” the boy interrupted, impa- 
tiently, “you always say that.” 

“ Here’s a letter from Prudence at last.” 

It was the girl who spoke, now looking up at her 
mother. 

“ Read it to me, dear,” was the response. But it 
was some moments before the mother and son could 
finish the altercation now entered into as to who 
should have charge of the ring until such time as it 
could be returned to the owner. 

Mrs. Ffolliott succeeded in gaining permission, 
Leander perceiving that the article would be safer in 
her care. But he cautioned her not to expect any 
share of the reward. 

Then he walked out of sight to some region 
momentarily unknown to his parent, and peace 
reigned on the piazza. 

Mrs. Ffolliott sat down in the chair and placidly 
waited. 

Carolyn stood leaning against the wall of the 
house. The open letter hung from her hand. 

“ That new man hasn’t brought back the veranda 
chairs since he swept here,” now remarked Mrs. 
Ffolliott. “ I wish you’d tell him — ” 

“ Yes, I will, presently,” replied the girl. “ Shall 
I read this to you now? She’s coming home.” 


AT SAVIN HILL. 


25 


“ Coming home ! ” 

“ Yes. Here’s what she says : ‘ My dear old 
fellow — ’ ” 

“Does she call you that?” interrupted Mrs. Ffol- 
liott. 

There was a slight smile on the girl’s face as she 
answered : 

“Yes ; she seems to mean me.” 

“ Oh, dear ! Well, it’s just like her. But then, 
anything is just like her. Go on, please.” 

“ ‘ My dear old fellow,’ ” again began Carolyn, “ * I 
suppose there is stuff that martyrs are made of, but 
none of that stuff got into my make-up, so I don’t 
mean ever to pose for that sort of thing. That is, 
never again ; but I’ve been doing it for the last four 
weeks. 

“ * You see, mamma would have me stay with her at 
Carlsbad. It has seemed as if I shpuld die. And 
how horrid you would feel if you should have to tell 
people, “ My dear cousin Prudence died at Carlsbad.” 
Because, you see, they don’t die at Carlsbad ; they 
hustle off somewhere to die and be buried. And if I 
should give up the ghost here I should be thought 
quite odd. But I shouldn’t care for that. Only I 
want to live, and I mean to. That’s why I’m not 
going to stand it. 


26 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


“ ‘ There hasn’t been a man here that it would pay 
to speak to, much less to look at. I might just as 
well have been a nurse. I shouldn’t have been so 
bored, for if I had really been one that knowledge 
would have sort of upheld me, — at least I think 
it would. 

“ ‘ And mamma will have me with her when she 
takes the mud baths. I have to stay right there and 
see her step into the big tub of ground peat and spru- 
del water. And there are snakes in it ; anyway, 
mamma feels just as if there were, and makes me feel 
so, which amounts to much the same thing, because 
if there were, they wouldn’t be poisonous, you know. 
She sits up to her neck for half an hour. Black mud ! 
Then a nurse comes and lifts out one arm ; pours 
water over it. Then the other arm ; pours water 
over it. Then mamma gradually rises and goes 
into a regular sprudel bath. I’m just pervading 
about as the dutiful daughter who is staying at Carls- 
bad with her mother. Every third day sprudel is 
omitted. 

“ ‘ Mamma has me with her when she goes to the 
springs to drink. Drinks six glasses ; stops after each 
glass to walk one-quarter of an hour. We walk one 
solid hour before breakfast. I go with the proces- 
sion of drinkers, with mamma on my arm. Oh, that 


AT SAVIN HILL. 2? 

procession of drinkers solemnly walking the time 
out ! 

“ 4 1 always look to see if there are any new men. 
You know I must do something. And there always 
are some new ones. But they are watching them- 
selves, their insides, you know, to see what the mud 
baths and the water are doing for them already. 
And I can tell you as a positive fact that a man who 
is watching to find what a mud bath has done to 
him is as uninteresting as a dummy. You try it 
and see, if you don’t believe me. 

“ ‘ One day I did have a bit of a sensation. I was 
going along just as primmy as prim, with mamma on 
my arm, when I suddenly felt as if somebody were 
staring at me. So I turned my eyes, and there was 
Lord Maxwell gazing right at me. He was one of 
the procession of drinkers. He was limping. Per- 
haps he has rheumatism, or, rather, of course he has 
it, or he wouldn’t be here. 

“ 4 1 wonder if I flushed. I couldn’t positively tell. 
But I bowed, and he raised his hat, and his face grew 
red. But the procession kept right on. If I should 
see him, he wouldn’t talk of anything but how many 
glasses he had to drink ; he wouldn’t, because it can’t 
be done here in Carlsbad. 

“ 4 Mamma converses a great deal about her food. 


28 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


For some reason she makes me listen, or pretend to 
listen. I know all about how she can eat bread, but 
no butter, and stewed fruits, and once in awhile an 
egg. You can skip this if you want to, but I can 
assure you I can’t skip it ; I have to take it three 
times a day, and sometimes in the night, — the talk 
about it, I mean. I have a bed in mamma’s room, 
and I have to be wakened and told how mamma 
detests bread without butter ; and she never did like 
eggs. 

“ ‘ I’ve borne the whole thing like an angel, I do 
believe ; particularly since Lord Maxwell came. He 
hasn’t been very interesting, but I was hoping all the 
time he would be. He still wears red neckties 
in the morning. He has gone now. He thought 
some other mud might do more for him than this 
mud. And I’ve told mamma that she positively must 
get along now with her maid and her nurse. And 
she’s a lot better, anyway. And I’m going to start 
from Antwerp ; and I shall alight at Savin Hill about 
as soon as you get this. And you must receive me 
with frantic delight. My love to Aunt Letitia, and to 
Leander, and to Devil ; and millions of kisses to your 
own self. But I’ll give them to you. I “don’t nohow 
expect ” that Rodney Lawrence is to be in Massachu- 
setts this summer. But if he should be with you, 


AT SAVIN HILL. 


2 9 


kind remembrances to him. I saw a man a few 
weeks ago from New York who said that Mr. Law- 
rence was bound to make his mark. I don’t suppose 
he cares for compliments any more. 

“ ‘ Ever your 

“ ‘ Prudence.’ ” 

As Carolyn finished reading the letter she folded 
it carefully and stood there in silence. 

Her mother drew a long breath. She contempla- 
tively patted a bow of ribbon on her morning dress. 

“That’s just like Prudence Ffolliott,” she said, at 
last. 

“ What is like her ? ” 

“Why, starting off and coming home all in a 
moment like that.” 

“ She has been abroad more than a year.” 

“Has she? Well, I’ve missed her unaccountably, 
but I must say I was relieved when she went. And 
now I shall be glad when she comes.” 

Carolyn turned her head and gazed at her mother 
for a moment. Then she smiled, slightly, as she 
said, “ One is bound to miss Prue one way or the 
other.” 

Mrs. Ffolliott continued to smooth the bow of 
ribbon. 

“And Rodney coming, too ! ” she exclaimed. 


30 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


“ That will make it interesting to all of us, don’t 
you see ? ” 

The girl made this remark a trifle satirically. 

“And Leander has found the ring she gave 
him ! ” 

The pronouns in this sentence were so indefinite 
in their reference that Carolyn smiled at them. But 
she did not take the trouble to reply. She knew her 
mother’s manner of speaking. 

Mrs. Ffolliott rose from her chair after a moment. 
She came to her daughter and put her hand on her 
arm as she asked, impressively : 

“Can’t you telegraph to Rodney not to come?” 

At this instant something made the girl turn 
quickly. Her face flushed crimson. She uttered 
an exclamation, and ran forward to the open door. 

On the other side of the screen there stood a man. 
He was tall, he was young, and at just this juncture 
he was laughing silently. 

He hastily swung open the wire door and stepped 
on to the piazza. He put one arm about the elder 
woman and one about the younger, and kissed first 
one and then the other. 

“Aunt Tishy,” he said, “I reached that door just 
in time to hear you ask if I couldn’t be telegraphed 
to not to come. No, I can’t be.” 


A T SA VIN HILL . 


31 


Mrs. Ffolliott was gazing with delight up at the 
young man’s face. Carolyn stood looking at him 
demurely. 

“ Is the scarlet fever here, and are you afraid I’ll 
take it ? ” he asked. 

“ Did you hear anything else we said ? ” she 
inquired. 

“ Not a word.” 

“ It has happened so unfortunately,” now began 
the elder lady. “ But what are we going to do ? ” 

“ Mamma ! ” exclaimed Carolyn. 

The young man began to be puzzled. A line came 
between his eyes. 

“ If you really want me to go — ” he began. 

“ No ; mamma is silly, that’s all,” said Carolyn, 
frankly. 

“ As if that were not enough ! ” Here Lawrence 
laughed, but the line did not leave his forehead. 

“ You’ll have to tell him now, mamma,” said the 
girl, “or he will really think we don’t want him.” 

Mrs. Ffolliott hesitated. And as she hesitated 
a glitter grew quite decidedly in Lawrence’s eyes. 
The Ffolliott home had always been his home, and 
though “ Aunt Tishy ” was not his aunt, but only a 
second cousin, she had been very kind to the boy 
whom she had persuaded her husband virtually to 


32 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


adopt when he had been left alone before he was ten 
years old. 

“ Yes, you will certainly have to tell me,” he said ; 
and he drew himself up a little as he spoke. “ I 
thought,” he went on, “when I overheard you speak 
of sending me a message, that you were going away 
somewhere ; but if it’s not convenient for you to 
have me — ” 

“ Now it’s you who are silly,” Carolyn interrupted. 

“You see,” said Mrs. Ffolliott, “we have just 
heard from Prudence.” 

“ Well ? ” 

Lawrence knew that Carolyn was carefully 
refraining from looking at him, and this knowledge 
keenly exasperated him. 

“ I thought that — I didn’t know but — ” 

Having proceeded thus far, Mrs. Ffolliott paused. 

Lawrence laughed, not quite pleasantly. 

“ You thought that if a man was once a fool he 
was always a fool?” he asked. 

“ I don’t know, I’m sure,” the lady answered, 
helplessly. “ Caro, you tell him.” 

“ One would think you were going to cut off an 
arm or a leg,” he said. 

“ It’s all quite ridiculous,” the girl began. “ Pru- 
dence writes that she is tired of staying abroad, and 


AT SA VIN HILL. 


33 


she is coming here. What she says is that she may 
‘alight at Savin Hill at any moment.’ ” 

Lawrence walked to one of the piazza pillars, and 
leaned against it. 

“ I suppose I must have been even more of a 
raving maniac about Prudence Ffolliott than I knew, 
and I knew I was the most infernal idiot that ever 
walked on the face of the globe,” he said, looking at 
Carolyn. “ At least I came to know it, you under- 
stand. But a man gets over a lot of things. You’ll 
find there won’t be a bit of melodrama or anything 
of the sort. You’ll have to let me stay, if that’s all 
you’ve got against my staying.” Here the speaker 
laughed gaily. 

“That’s so nice, I’m sure,” said’ the elder lady, 
comfortably ; “ and now we won’t think anything 
more about it.” 

But Lawrence did not seem to hear her. He was 
still gazing, somewhat markedly, at the girl, who 
smiled a little constrainedly at him, as she said: 

“It’s very odd, but Leander has just found that 
ring that Prue gave you, and that ^you lost so 
unaccountably.” 

“ Has he ? ” The young man closed his lips 
tightly for an instant. Then he laughed, and said, 
« In that case I must owe the boy fifty dollars. 


34 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


That’s the reward I offered. I remember at the 
time I wanted to offer five hundred, but you told 
me, Caro, that the smaller sum would be just as 
effective.” 

Lawrence turned and walked across the veranda. 
Mrs. Ffolliott went into the house. The young man 
returned to Carolyn’s side. 

“ It all seems a thousand years ago,” he* said. “ I 
was wild — wild for her. I suppose I was some- 
body else ; don’t you think I was somebody else, 
Caro ? ” 

“ No. And it is not quite two years since then.” 

“ How literal you are ! ” 

“ Am I ? ” she asked, smiling. 

“ Yes. And such a comfort to me. Caro, I’m 
going to kiss your hand.” 

He took both of the girl’s hands, held them closely, 
then kissed them gently. 

“ I’m sorry you and Aunt Tishy seemed to think 
you must arrange so that I shouldn’t see Prudence. 
It makes me appear such a weak fellow. Do you 
think I am a weak fellow, Caro ? ” 

“ No.” 

“ Honest Indian ? ” 

“ Honest Indian.” 

“ Oh, I’m glad of that. I find I am asking myself 


AT SAVIN HILL. 35 

so many times if Caro thinks this or that of me. 
Perhaps you call that weak? ” 

But the girl only laughed at this remark. 

Then they talked of a great many things, until 
Lawrence asked, suddenly, “ Where did Leander find 
that ring ? ” 

Carolyn told him. 

“ Odd ! Of course it was Devil’s work ? ” 

“ Yes. He took my gold thimble, you know.” 

The young man said, “ I’m sure Lee won’t let me 
off ; he’ll exact every penny. I would gladly have 
given all my possessions to get it back again when I 
lost it. But now — ” 

Here Lawrence paused. He was gazing persist- 
ently at his companion. But she did not seem to be 
aware of this gaze. She did not try to help him out 
with his sentence. She was standing in perfect quiet ; 
she was not a nervous woman, and she could remain 
for several moments without moving. 

It was six months since Lawrence had seen Caro- 
lyn. He was wondering if she had always impressed 
him as she impressed him now. If she had done so, 
he thought it was inexplicable that he should have 
forgotten. 

But then, formerly, he had seen somebody else. 
That accounted for everything, of course. 


36 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


■ At this fancy he smiled. 

And he wished that carbuncle had not been found. 
It seemed awkward to have that turn up now when 
he had ceased to care for it. It was like a ghost 
stalking out of the past. 

He took a step towards the door. 

“ I’m as dingy with heat and dust as a savage,” 
he remarked. “ I suppose I can have my old 
room ? ” 

“ Of course.” 

“ All right, then. Do stay out here until I come 
down, Caro ; will you ? ” 

He advanced now towards her. 

“ Will you ? ” 

“ If mamma doesn’t call me.” 

“Very well.” 

Lawrence went into the hall and to the foot of 
the stairs. With his hand on the post, he paused. 
He stood there an instant, then he turned back. He 
rejoined the girl on the piazza. She had walked to 
the railing and was leaning both hands upon it. 
Lawrence caught a glimpse of her profile, and his 
own face grew tender at sight of it. 

“ Where in the world have my eyes been ? ” he 
asked himself. 

She turned quickly as he came through the door. 


AT SAVIN HILL. 37 

“ I came back because I was afraid Aunt Tishy 
would call you,” he said. 

“ Oh ! ” 

“ Yes.” 

Then the two stood in silence. 

“ You see, I wanted to ask you about that man 
person who was hanging around you when I was at 
home the last time.” 

“ What man person ? ” 

“ No wonder you don’t know. I ought to be more 
specific. I mean the Morgan fellow.” 

“ Nothing about him that I know.” 

Lawrence flung back his shoulders. His eyes 
began to sparkle. 

“ All the better for me, then,” he exclaimed. 
“Caro,” he went on, more softly, “do you think 
you could possibly make up your mind to marry 
me?” 

There was a moment’s silence, during which the 
girl’s eyes were drooped. She had not flushed ; she 
had grown white. 

“ Could you do it ? ” he repeated, gently. 

He bent and took her hand. She withdrew it. 

« I’m sorry you’ve asked me this,” she said. 

To these words he made no reply. His face grew 
a trifle set. 


38 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


“ Because,” she went on, hesitatingly, — “ because 
I feel almost sure — at least I’m afraid — ” 

“ Well ? ” He spoke peremptorily. 

“ I’m nearly certain that you don’t know surely 
that — that you’ve stopped loving Prudence.” 

He burst into a laugh ; but he stopped laughing 
directly. He took her hand again. “ Is that all ? ” 
he asked. 

“ Yes ; I think that’s all. And that’s quite enough. 
You see, I was here when you were in love with her ; 
I know something about how you loved her. You 
did love her. And you can’t have forgotten it in less 
than two years. Why, I couldn’t forget such an ex- 
perience in a lifetime. It must have been like — like 
fire sweeping over your heart.” 

“ But a man comes to his senses ; a man gets over 
everything, you know. And I’ve had my lesson.” 

Lawrence was speaking eagerly now. His whole 
face began to glow. 

“ If you could only say yes to me, dear Caro ! ” 
he went on. “ If you feel hopeful that you could 
learn to love me, — tell me, do you think you could 
learn ? ” 

She smiled, and Lawrence asked himself why he 
had never before particularly noticed her smile. 

“ I think I could learn,” she said, at last. 


AT SAVIN HILL. 


39 


“ Then you are promised to me ? Caro, say , 4 Rod- 
ney, I am promised to you.’ ” 

He had drawn her more closely. 

“ Say it.” 

“Rodney, I am promised to you.” 

“ Thank you, dear little girl, thank you. We shall 
be as happy as the day is long. I begin to be happy 
already.” 

She looked up at him wistfully. Her features 
were not quite steady. 

“ Oh,” she whispered, “ I hope you haven’t made 
a mistake ! ” 

“ I’m sure I’ve not.” 

He kissed her, but she shrank a little from him. 
She put her hand on his breast, and thrust him from 
her. 

“ If you find you have made a mistake,” she said, 
solemnly, “ remember you are not bound, — not 
bound one instant after you see how blind you’ve 
been.” 

“ I am glad to be bound to you,” he returned, as 
solemnly as she had spoken, — “ grateful beyond 
words, Caro, as time will prove to you.” 

The girl suddenly took the man’s hands, and held 
them fast, looking earnestly in his face as she did 
so. 


40 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


Then she said, nearly in a whisper : 

“Yes, I love you, Rodney.” 

But the instant she had uttered those words, she 
was aware that he had not spoken thus, and a scorch- 
ing blush rose to her face, and burned there until 
she was almost suffocated with it. 

“ Bless you for that ! Oh, you don’t know how I 
bless you for that ! ” exclaimed Lawrence, quickly. 
“ And I love you with a love that lasts, — that means 
something, — that takes hold on life.” 

He spoke fervently. He had his arm about Caro 
now. His eyes were shining. 

It was at this moment that a small figure in a naval 
suit appeared on the outside of the piazza, at the 
farther end of it. This figure noiselessly vaulted 
over the railing, and as noiselessly came forward. 

Within a few yards Leander paused, with his 
hands thrust to the very depths of his pockets, and 
his small legs wide apart. His eyes were what ro- 
mance writers used to call “glued” to the two 
standing there. His mouth was stretched in an 
appreciative grin. Directly it changed from a grin 
to a round shape, and a shrill whistle was emitted 
from it. 

The two started. Lawrence wheeled round, 
frowning. He subdued his first impulse, which 


AT SAVIN HILL. 


41 


was to take that atom and fling him over the 
railing. 

Leander nodded amicably. 

“ How de do ? ” he inquired. 

“ I’m pretty well, thank ye,” answered Lawrence. 

The boy looked with a new and curious interest at 
his sister. “ Was she in love ? ” he was asking him- 
self. And he immediately put the question aloud : 

“ I say, sis, are you in love ? Is that why you ’n’ 
Rodney were huggin’ so ? ” 

“ Hold your tongue,” Lawrence promptly com- 
manded. 

“All right.” Then, contemplatively, “I s’pose 
you ’n’ sis are spoons, ain’t you ? That’s what 
the new chambermaid ’n’ the coachman are. He 
told me the other day that he ’n’ she were spoons. 
They were huggin’, too. And I asked him about 
it.” 

“ I’ll swear you asked him about it,” responded 
Lawrence. 

Then the young man made a diversion. He 
walked forward, and laid hold of Leander’ s shoulder. 

“ I heard you found a ring,” he said. 

The boy puckered his face, and gazed up at the 
face above him. 

“You bet,” he replied at last. “Prove property 


42 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


and pay for this advertisement, and — fork over the 
fifty dollars, — that is, if you want her.” 

At this stage in the conversation, Leander’s sister 
escaped to her own room, where she sat for a long 
time by the window, looking off on the bay. 

Below she heard the murmur of voices, the shrill 
tones of her brother, and the deeper tones of Rodney. 

She put her hand down to her belt. Her fingers 
touched something which rustled. She had thrust 
her cousin’s letter into her belt. She now drew it 
out, and read it again. She read it as if it were 
written in a foreign language, and as if she 
were translating it word by word. 


CHAPTER II. 


A SLIGHT ACCIDENT. 

When it is summer-time, and you are engaged to 
the most perfect man in the world, and you are at a 
lovely seaside cottage with him, and are boating, and 
playing tennis, and trying to play golf, and cycling, 
and it is a little too early for any of all those people 
who are going to visit you really to arrive, — when 
such conditions prevail, you don’t expect time to 
drag. 

And time did not drag with Carolyn Ffolliott, — 
it flew. 

A week had gone when one day at breakfast Mrs. 
Ffolliott remarked that she had almost a good mind 
to worry. 

Her daughter looked at her questioningly, and 
Leander, with his mouth full, said that “ Marmer’d 
rather give a dollar any time than miss a worry.” 

But marmer took no notice of her son ; she con- 
tinued to gaze at Carolyn, with her brows wrinkled. 


43 


44 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


“Prudence, you know,” she went on. “She said 
she might come any minute.” 

“ I suppose she changed her mind.” 

“ Perhaps. But I’ve been dreaming about her ; 
I thought she was drowned, and when I told you, 
Caro, you laughed, and said it was a good thing. I 
was so shocked I — but, good heavens ! Caro, what 
makes you look like that ? ” 

“ Like what ? ” 

“Why, just as you did in my dream, — that same 
light in your eyes — ” 

“Mamma!” broke in the girl, angrily. But she 
did not say anything more. 

At that moment a servant came into the room 
with a salver in her hand, and on the salver lay a 
yellow telegraph envelope. 

Carolyn half rose from the table, then she sat 
down, for she saw the servant was coming to 
her. 

To these people a telegram was little different 
from an ordinary note. Everybody telegraphed 
about everything. Notwithstanding this, the girl 
could not keep her hand quite steady as she tore 
open the cover. 

Her mother watched her face ; she was still 
thinking of her dream. 


A SLIGHT ACCIDENT. 45 

Immediately Carolyn began to smile. She read 
aloud : 

“ Please send your wheel over to station for 1 1 40 train. 

“ Prudence Ffolliott.” 

The elder woman stirred her coffee desperately. 
“She isn’t drowned, then,” she said. 

“ Apparently not, since she wants my wheel.” 

“ Shall you send it ? ” 

“Yes.” 

“ Sha’n’t you drive over to meet her ? ” 

“ No.” 

“Well,” said the elder lady, forcibly, “I call it 
ridiculous, coming home from Europe on a bicycle ! 
I don’t see when she learned, either. I thought she 
had been giving her mother mud baths, and all that 
sort of thing, and being devoted and — and what not.” 

“ As for that,” responded Carolyn, “I don’t know 
but Prue would be able to learn to ride a wheel in a 
mud bath itself.” 

“ Bully for Prue ! ” cried Leander. 

“ My son ! ” said his mother, at which he grinned, 
but kindly refrained from repeating the remark. 

Carolyn had risen from the table. She held the 
message crumpled in her hand. 

« Sha’n’t you meet her anyway ? ” 


46 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

“ How can I if I send my wheel ? — but I have an 
idea that she doesn’t care. I don’t precisely know 
what she does mean, so I shall wait.” 

“ I sha’n’t wait,” suddenly announced Leander. 
“ I shall spin down there myself.” 

“ And when is Rodney coming back, did you 
say ? ” 

“ Not until to-morrow.” 

Mrs. Ffolliott indulged in some remarks on the 
ways of young people at the present time, to which 
no reply was made. 

So it happened that when the eleven-forty train 
steamed up to the little station, there were on the 
platform but two people, the agent and a small boy 
in a suit so close and abbreviated as to be almost no 
suit at all. 

This boy was standing by his own wheel, and an- 
other bicycle leaned against the wall of the building. 

Leander was scowling along the steps of every car, 
and saying to himself : 

“ I’ll bet she hasn’t come. Women never do 
anything right. I wanted to race her home.” 

Three men and a small girl had alighted. It was 
no use looking any more. There, the train was 
moving. 

“ Oh, thunder ! ” said the boy. 


A SLIGHT ACCIDENT. 47 

He was turning away, when something touched his 
shoulder, and somebody asked : 

“ Leander, why are you saying ‘ thunder ? ’ ” 

He flung about quickly. He snatched off his atom 
of a cap and looked up at the tall girl beside him. 

“ Now, that’s O. K.,” he said, “and I’ll race you 
home. How de do ? You do look grand, though. 
And you can’t ride a bike in that suit, — no more’n 
a bose.” 

“ Can’t I ? We’ll see. Let us kiss each other, 
Leander.” 

“All right. I ain’t no objections.” 

The two kissed. Then Leander put on his 
cap. 

Prudence Ffolliott was dressed with extreme 
plainness in a perfectly fitting suit of brown with a 
white hat, and she had on gloves like those which 
a few girls can find, and which most, girls pass all 
their lives trying to find. And yet it might seem 
an easy matter to get rather loose brown gloves 
like these. She had a small leather bag in one 
hand. 

She glanced up and down the platform. The 
train had sped away. The long waste of track lay 
desolate beneath the brilliant sun. The woods came 
up close on the other side of the rails. On this side 


48 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


a country road wound up a slight acclivity. There 
was one “ open wagon,” drawn by a sorrel horse, 
slowly ascending this hill. In the wagon sat three 
men very much crowded on the one seat. In the 
still air was a low, continuous sound. 

Prudence listened ; she sniffed the air. 

“ I hear the waves,” she said. “ The tide is 
coming in ; and the wind is east.” 

“ Yes,” said Leander, “ I should have gone perchin’ 
if I hadn’t come down here. And I might as well 
have gone, for you can’t ride. Just look at all the 
pleats and pipes ’n’ things on your skirt ! It’s too 
bad ! And sis sent her bike down. You wired for 
it, you know.” 

“ Yes,” said the girl, “ I know I wired for it. Wait 
for the transformation scene. How is Caro ? ” 

“ She’s well enough,” said the boy, shortly. 

“ And Aunt Letitia ? ” 

‘‘Well’s ever.” 

“ Any company yet ? ” 

“ Only Rodney.” 

It was an instant before the girl asked : 

“Is Mr. Lawrence there ? ” 

“Yep. ’N’ he ’n’ sis are such spoons that they 
ain’t either of ’em any fun.” 

“Spoons, are they?” Prudence laughed slightly. 


A SLIGHT ACCIDENT. 


49 


“Yep. ’N’ I found Rod’s ring, and marmer ’n’ 
sis raised a most awful row ’bout my takin’ the 
reward. They said it wasn’t gentlemanly of me, 
bein’ a friend and relation, to take it. Still they did 
let Rod give me two ten spots. But I didn’t get 
marmer any present out of that, you bet ! ” 

“ What ring was it ? ” 

While Prudence was talking she opened her bag 
and selected from its contents a leather strap. 

Leander was so absorbed in watching her, and in 
wondering what she would do, that he did not hear 
her question. 

He already began to have faith that she would be 
equal to any emergency, — that is, as nearly equal 
as anything feminine could be. 

“ What ring did you find ? ” she repeated. 

As she spoke, she took a pair of white gloves from 
the bag, and extended them to the boy. 

“ Please hold them,” she said. His little brown 
fingers closed over the gloves. 

“Why,” he answered, “that red stone, you know, 
with the head cut into it.” 

“ Oh ! ” 

She made no other remark for some time. The 
boy continued to watch her. He rather admired the 
deft way in which her hands removed something 


50 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


which made her belt slip' from its place, and the next 
moment her skirt, which he had derided, dropped 
down to the floor of the platform, her jacket was 
flung off, and there Miss Ffolliott stood in a full 
bicycle suit of white flannel. It was then that 
Leander noticed that her shoes and hat were white, 
as he said, “ to begin with.” 

He jumped up and down. “ Hurray ! ” he cried, 
in his thin, sharp voice. “ I guess you c’n do it.” 

“ I guess I can,” she answered. “ Now I want to 
strap up this skirt, and we’ll take it and the bag 
along. Are you good on a bike ? ” She turned and 
looked at her companion with a laugh in her eyes. 
She had just now so lithe and active an appearance 
that the boy wanted to clap his hands. She took 
the white gloves from him, and began to put them 
on. 

“Good on a bike?” he repeated. “Well, you 
just wait. Are you good on one yourself ? I ought 
to be ; marmer says she’s expectin’ every minute to 
see me brought in with all my bones smashed. But 
I don’t take headers nigh so often’s I used to. 
Ready ? ” 

Leander gallantly brought forward his sister’s 
wheel, and held it. Within the station the agent 
was peering out from his window at the girl in white. 


A SLIGHT ACCIDENT. 


51 


He was shocked, but he was extremely interested, 
and he did not wink in his gaze until the boy and 
woman had wheeled out of sight along the lonely 
country road. 

Leander immediately found that his small legs 
were called upon to do their utmost, but he kept on 
bravely. And he would not pant ; he assumed an 
easy appearance. He even tried to whistle, but he 
had to give that up. 

He glanced covertly at his companion. She sat up 
straight, and her figure showed very little movement. 

Presently she asked, “ Why didn’t Caro come to 
meet me ? ” 

“ She kinder thought you didn’t care to have her, 
as you sent for her wheel.” 

No answer. Then, “ Perhaps she’s gone some- 
where with Mr. Lawrence.” 

“ No, she ain’t, either. Rodney’s off just now — 
cornin’ back to-morrow. I say ! ” 

“ Well ? ” 

“ Slow up a bit. I can’t stand this. I give in. I 
guess my legs ain’t long enough. You’re stunnin’ 
on a bike. Caro’s rather good, but — Hullo ! what’s 
that ahead, anyway ? Let’s put in ’n’ get to it.” 

So they put in. In another moment they saw that 
the something was a man ; then that he was lying 


52 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


flat on his face ; then that it was Rodney Lawrence. 
It was the girl who discovered who it was. In- 
stead of shrinking back a little, as Leander had done 
in spite of himself, when they found that it was a 
man lying there, Prudence forced her wheel up to 
the prostrate body, jumped off, and looked down at 
him. She stood perfectly still for an instant. Then 
she turned towards Leander. 

“ It’s Rodney,” she said, in a low voice. 

“ I don’t believe it !” cried the boy. 

He felt that it was impossible for Rodney to be 
hurt so that he would lie as stiff and dreadful as 
that. Some other man might be hurt thus, but not 
Rodney. With this rebellious disbelief in his fast- 
beating heart, Leander dismounted ; he stood a little 
behind Prudence, and peered round her at the object 
on the ground. 

“ It is Rodney,” repeated the girl. 

Her face was quite white, and her eyelids, as she 
looked down, fluttered as if they would close over 
her eyes and thus shut out the sight of the senseless 
man. But she was calm enough as she turned to 
the boy. 

She did not immediately speak. She glanced 
around the place. There was a wood on each side of 
the road. They might be there half a day, she knew, 


A SLIGHT ACCIDENT. 


53 


and no one would come along. It was not the main 
road, which itself was not much travelled. 

She seemed to give up her intention of speak- 
ing. She pulled off a glove and knelt down in the 
gravel. She put out one hand, and gently turned 
the head so that the face was a little more visible. 
She shuddered as she did so. The vertical sun 
struck on a diamond on her hand, and made it 
send out sharp rays of light. 

With a swift motion the girl turned the stone 
inward. Then she shuddered again. She rose. 

“ I’ll go on to the first house,” she said, “and get 
help.” 

“No, I’ll go,” exclaimed Leander, quickly, and in 
an unsteady voice. 

“ I can go in much less time than you could do 
the distance. You don’t know how fast I can ride. 
It’s almost three miles to the next house. Are you 
afraid to stay here and wait ? ” 

The boy trembled and hesitated. Then he was 
ashamed to say he was afraid. 

“ I’ll wait here,” he said, huskily. 

Prudence sprang on her wheel and started off. 
Leander watched her. For an instant he forgot 
everything else in admiration as he saw her whiz out 
of sight. 


54 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


“ By George ! ” he said to himself. 

Then he looked back at that still figure. He braced 
himself up. He remembered that he was a boy 
instead of a girl. 

He sat down on a stone by the wayside. He 
leaned his chin on his hands and stared at Rodney. 
Was that Rodney ? If the man were dead, why, 
then it was not anybody ; it was — oh, what was 
it? 

And how could Rodney, so full of life and health 
and strength, be there so helpless ? 

A great many strange and solemn thoughts came 
to the boy’s mind as he sat there. 

And all the time he was listening for wheels, hop- 
ing that a carriage would come along. 

The mosquitoes buzzed about his face and stung 
him unheeded. 

He noticed that Rodney wore corduroys and 
leather leggings, and that a whip lay on the ground 
a few yards off. Leander went and picked up the 
whip, which he knew very well. 

But how strange even the whip seemed ! So Rod- 
ney had been riding ; and he had come home sooner 
than he had been expected. 

If he should be really dead, Leander supposed that 
his sister would mourn herself to death. He sup- 


A SLIGHT ACCIDENT. 


55 


posed his sister was in love with this long, still 
figure of a man. 

All at once the little watcher felt the tears spring- 
ing up and blinding him. He rubbed his fists into 
his eyes, but the tears would come. It was while he 
was doing this that he thought he heard a sound ; as 
he could not distinguish what the sound was, he 
dared not take his hands from his face, and he dared 
not move. 

Was it really a groan ? 

His curiosity overcame his terror. He looked at 
the man in the road. Lawrence had raised him- 
self on his elbow, but he immediately sank back 
again. 

Leander ran to him. 

Lawrence gazed in a blind sort of way at the 
boy. Then he half smiled, and said, feebly, “ I 
suppose you’re dead too, Lee, and we’re both in 
heaven.” 

“ I ain’t dead, for one,” answered the boy. And 
then he sobbed outright in the intensity of his 
relief. 

“Then perhaps I’m not.” 

A long silence, during which Lawrence stared 
rather stupidly at nothing, and Leander stared at 
him. 


56 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

After a little the boy bethought himself to ask if 
he couldn’t help. 

“ I don’t know. I thought I’d wait until my 
mind cleared more.” 

He raised his head again. 

“ What’s that ? ” he asked. * 

He was looking at a white glove that lay near him 
on the ground. 

He dropped his head and slowly reached forth his 
hand till he grasped the glove. 

“ It’s hers,” was the answer. 

“ Hers ? Caro’s ? ” he asked, eagerly. 

But as he spoke the faint odor of iris came to him 
from the bit of leather in his grasp. He knew that 
odor of iris ; it had always been inseparable from 
anything belonging to Prudence Ffolliott. 

“No,” replied Leander ; “it’s Prue’s.” 

Lawrence lay silent. His face was dull and 
clouded. 

“ Oh, I do wish I could do something ! ” exclaimed 
Leander. “ She’s gone on for help.” 

“ Who’s gone on ? ” 

“Why, Prue, of course.” 

Lawrence lifted himself up on his elbow again. 

“ I had a nasty fall,” he said. “ I thought I was 
done for. Where’s my horse ? ” 


A SLIGHT ACCIDENT. 


57 


“I ain’t seen any horse.” 

“ It was one I was trying. Luckily, he’ll go 
home to his own stable, and the stablemen won’t 
break their hearts with anxiety.” 

The young man spoke quite like himself ; and his 
face began to gain in color. He pressed his hand to 
his head. He laughed a little. “ I must have a 
thick skull of my own,” he said. 

He turned and twisted, and then he rose to a 
sitting posture. 

The glove had dropped to the ground. He looked 
down at it, made a slight motion as if he would take 
it, then turned away. 

“ I’m sorry I’ve made such a scene as this,” he 
said. “ It’s unlucky that you should have happened 
along here now. You see I should have come to 
myself all right, and nobody been frightened. Give 
me a hand, Lee. There ! The deuce ! I can’t do 
it, though ! ” 

% ' 

Lawrence sank back on the ground, and again lay 
quiet. 

Leander could prevent himself from wringing his 
hands only by remembering that he was a boy. He 
recalled how in all the stories of adventure he had 
read the right person always had a bottle of whisky 
or brandy to produce at the right moment. But he 


58 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


had nothing. He hadn’t even a string in his pocket. 
He “went in ” for the lightest possible weight when 
on his wheel. 

Thank fortune, there was Prue coming back. She 
had made good time, even to his anxious mind. 

The girl’s wheel glided up, and she alighted from 
it as swiftly as a bird would have done. 


CHAPTER III. 


“ I WANT TO ASK YOU A QUESTION.” 

She bent down over Lawrence, who opened his 
eyes and looked at her. 

“Oh!” she said, in a whisper. The thought 
which sprang swiftly into her mind was the thought 
of the last time she had seen this man. It was the 
time when she had told him that she had changed 
her mind about marrying him, and had decided to 
marry Lord Maxwell. But later, Lord Maxwell, for 
financial reasons and under parental influence, had 
also changed his mind, and had married somebody 
else. This was in Prudence’s thought as she said, 
“ Oh ! ” in a whisper. 

“You see I’m not dead,” remarked Lawrence, 
“only devilishly unlucky.” 

Prudence stood up erect. 

“It quite relieves me to hear you say devilishly,” 
she responded ; “cheers my heart, indeed.” 

“But why?” 

“Because men who are mortally hurt are more 
59 


6o 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


pious ; if they wanted to say a bad word they would 
not do it. Thank you.” 

Lawrence smiled. 

“ I could cheer your heart still more,” he an- 
swered, “for there aj-e a lot of bad words just 
galloping to be said.” 

Prudence did not reply. She turned to Leander, 
and asked if Mr. Lawrence had been conversing like 
this, and had he been shamming when they had first 
found him. 

At .this Lawrence groaned. After a few moments 
the boy and woman assisted him to rise. He leaned 
heavily on them, but seemed to improve somewhat. 

“ I don’t think you’ve done much more than break 
a few ribs and a collar-bone or so,” said the girl, 
cheerfully. 

“And p’raps concussed your brain a bit,” added 
Leander, whose spirits were rising rapidly. 

“There comes the cart,” announced Prudence. 
“ It hasn’t any springs, but I didn’t know but you 
were past minding springs. I did insist on a mat- 
tress being put in ; only it isn’t a mattress, but a 
feather bed.” 

Lawrence groaned again. 

“ That’s right,” she said ; “ don’t suffer in 

silence.” 


• “/ WANT TO ASK YOU A QUESTION ” 6 1 

It was not long now before the two men who 
came in the cart had assisted Lawrence into it. At 
first he refused to sit down on the feather bed. He 
caught a glimpse of Prudence’s laughing face as she 
said, “ If you don’t, I shall think you’re ungrateful 
for all we’ve done for you.” 

On this the young man sank down on the bed. 
“I’ve only been stunned,” he said, morosely, “and 
you needn’t make any more fuss about it.” 

“ All right ; have it your own way ; but I insist on 
the ribs and the collar-bones. Now I’ll go on and 
prepare the minds of your friends.” 

Before anything more could be said, Miss Ffolliott 
pedalled away. 

Leander lifted his machine into the cart, and then 
placed himself between it and the feather bed. The 
horse started on his walk to Savin Hill. 

As he started, Lawrence raised his head and 
looked back to the spot of ground where he had 
fallen. He saw something white lying there, and he 
knew that it was Miss Ffolliott’s glove. 

Miss Ffolliott herself rode swiftly along the shady, 
solitary road. She knew the way very well. She 
had ridden and driven here many times with the man 
who was lying there in the farm cart. He had been 
in love with her, — extravagantly, furiously, delight- 




62 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


fully. She smiled as she remembered. Some men 
could make love so much more agreeably than others. 
She supposed that was a matter of temperament. 

And he wasn’t hurt very much, after all. And he 
and Caro were “ spoons ” now. She smiled more 
broadly. 

“ I always suspected that Caro cared,” she thought, 
“ and I was right. How funny it is ! Well, I shall 
know precisely the state of the case in three seconds 
after I’ve seen them together. And I’ve come now.” 

She seemed to slide without propulsion along the 
road. She whistled two or three bars of a tune she 
had often whistled while she had sat beside her 
mother when the latter lady had been up to her 
neck in ground peat and sprudel water. 

Sometimes the girl flung back her head and 
sniffed the air, much as a young colt sniffs when 
it has just been let out into a field after a long 
confinement. 

But she did not relax her speed. It was not long 
before she turned into a better kept road, and here 
she saw ahead of her, and walking towards her, the 
figure of her cousin Carolyn, who began to hasten 
directly. 

They fell on each other’s necks, after the manner 
of girls, and kissed and hugged. 




“/ WANT 70 ASK YOU A QUESTION” 63 

Then Prudence held her off, and examined her, 
smiling slightly all the while. 

“ Lee told me you were no good any more,” she 
said, at last. 

Then Caro blushed and blushed. 

“ I suppose you’re happy ? ” 

“ Yes.” 

“ Of course. Well, I’ve been to the mud baths of 
Carlsbad, and I’m not particularly happy. However, 
I congratulate you ; and I won’t be de trop any 
more than is absolutely necessary for the sake of 
appearances.” 

Prudence propelled her wheel with one hand ; the 
other arm she put about her companion’s waist, and 
so the two went out. 

“ Mr. Lawrence has returned,” presently said 
Prudence. 

“ How do you know ? ” the other asked, quickly. 

“ Because we met him, Leander and I, on the 
Pine-wood road. Now if you scream I won’t tell you 
anything more ; and it really isn’t anything to speak 
of, only he is on his way here now, and on a feather 
bed also, because they didn’t have any mattresses. 
If it isn’t ribs it’s collar-bone, — what was it the 
Physiology used to call collar-bone ? — and he’s sane, 
and knew me, and wanted to swear, but wouldn’t, 


6 4 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


much. So you see you needn’t be alarmed a 
particle.” 

Carolyn had detached herself from her companion, 
and was gazing at her, her lips growing white, as she 
listened. 

“ His horse threw him,” added Prudence, shortly. 

“ Threw him ? ” 

“Yes,” with still more impatience. “What else 
do you want me to say. Didn’t I tell -you he was on 
his way home, and that it was a feather bed only 
because I couldn’t get a mattress ? I did as well as 
I could.” 

Here Prudence gave a short laugh, and lightly 
kissed her companion’s cheek. 

Carolyn tried to appear calm. Her imagination 
had leaped to every dreadful thing. She wanted 
to turn her back on this girl, but, instead of doing 
that, she looked at her intently, and asked, steadily : 

“ Are you telling me the truth ? ” 

“ Absolutely. I don’t think your precious young 
man is hurt much, only shaken up a bit.” 

The two girls were silent for a few moments. 
Carolyn had turned, and they were both walking 
back over the road, that they might the sooner meet 
the cart that was bringing Lawrence to Savin Hill. 

“ Providence made a great mistake in sending me 


“/ WANT TO ASK YOU A QUESTION.” 65 

to find your lover,” at last said Prudence. “ If Provi- 
dence had wished to do the perfectly correct thing, 
you would have been on the *Pine-wood road this 
morning. But then, when does Providence act 
quite up to the mark ? I am tired of Providence 
myself.” 

Though Carolyn gazed at the speaker, she did not 
apparently hear her. Her eyes wandered off down 
the road. 

After another short silence, Prudence spoke again. 

“ I hope there are people coming to the house 
this summer. I should go raving mad if I had only 
you and Rodney, and you two in love with each 
other.” 

The girl shrugged her shoulders, and shuddered. 
As there was no answer, she repeated : 

“ I suppose you are in love with each other, aren’t 
you ? ” 

“ I suppose so,” mechanically. 

“ That’s what I thought. Are there people com- 
ing ? ” 

“ Oh, yes.” 

“ Men ? ” 

“ A few.” 

“Ah, I revive! If you had had as much to do 
with sprudel water as I have, you would be as thank- 


66 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

ful as I am at the prospect of seeing some men who 
are not slyly feeling their pulse while they talk to 
you. You needn’t look so curiously at me. It is 
strictly proper for a girl to like men, only it’s very 
improper to acknowledge the liking. And when 
they begin to get in love — Oh, isn’t that the head 
of the procession appearing? Yes. Now, Caro, 
run and throw yourself on your betrothed, and sing 
in a high soprano how thankful you are to see him 
yet again — again — a-g-a — in! You see, I’ve not 
forgotten my opera.” 

But Carolyn did not run. She walked slowly for- 
ward, her hands very cold, hanging inertly down, her 
lips pressed tightly together. 

Of one thing she was sure, — that she would not 
“make a scene. Yes, she would die rather than make 
a scene. 

There was the bed, and there was Lawrence loung- 
ing upon it. Leander was standing rigidly straight, 
grasping the stakes of the cart. He shouted shrilly 
as he saw his sister. The old horse, which always 
stopped on any pretext whatever, stopped now, and 
drooped, as if he would lie down. 

“ I say, sis,” said Leander, jumping from the tail 
of the cart, “ don’t you go and begin to cry, and all 
that stuff.” 


“/ WANT TO ASK YOU A QUESTION 67 

“ I don’t think your sister will cry, Leander,” 
remarked Lawrence, with some dryness. 

Carolyn came to the side of the cart. She said 
that she hoped Mr. Lawrence was not much hurt, 
and Mr. Lawrence replied that he should be all right 
in a few hours. 

Then the horse was induced to start on. After a 
while they all reached the house, and Lawrence was 
helped to his room, while Leander volunteered to go 
on his wheel for the doctor. 

In due time the doctor came, and pronounced that 
the young man would be as well as usual again in a 
few days. 

The two girls were standing on the piazza, 
when this decision was announced to them by 
Mrs. Ffolliott. 

Carolyn walked quickly to the nearest chair, and 
sat down. She fixed her eyes on that line of daz- 
zling brightness which was the sea. But she saw 
nothing. Prudence sauntered to the railing, and 
leaned against it. 

Presently Mrs. Ffolliott returned to the house, 
and the two were alone. 

Prudence walked to a long chair near her cousin, 
and placed herself luxuriously in it. She still wore 
her bicycle suit. She crossed her legs, and, leaning 


68 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. * 


forward, embraced her knees with her clasped 
hands. 

“ Got a smoke about you, Caro ? ” she asked. 

“ No. And I didn’t know you had taken up 
smoking.” 

“ No more I have. But my attitude, and the 
piazza, and a certain natural depravity in my own 
breast suggested the question. I think I shall try 
cigarettes. And one can have a truly divine thing 
in cigarette-cases now. And a woman’s hand is 
peculiarly fitted to show jewels when holding a 
weed out — thus.” 

The speaker extended her left hand, while she 
seemed to puff smoke from her lips as she did 
so. 

Carolyn smiled slightly, as she said : 

“ You are just the same, aren’t you ? ” 

“Of course. You didn’t think I had met with a 
change, did you ? ” 

“ Hardly.” 

Carolyn clasped her hands, and gazed down at 
them. A cloud was on her face. 

“You are not worrying about that great strapping 
fellow . up-stairs, are you ? ” Prudence asked the 
question sharply. 

“ No.” 


“/ WANT TO ASK YOU A QUESTION” 69 

“ You didn’t seem to feel much when you met him 
just now,” remarked Prudence. 

“ I didn’t want to make a scene,” was the reply. 

Prudence contemplated her companion for a moment 
in silence. Then she said that she had a bit of advice 
to offer ; advice was easily given, and it never hurt 
any one, because no one ever followed it. 

“ What is it ? ” 

“ Don’t be quite so self-controlled, or Rodney will 
begin to think you seem indifferent because you feel so. 
You know men are creatures who have no intuition, 
and who can’t see the fraction of an inch below the 
surface. And though they say they don’t like scenes, 
they do, when it’s love for them that makes the scene. 
I don’t charge you a cent for this information. I do 
wish I had a cigarette ; I’d try it this very minute. 

‘“’Twas off the blue Canary Isle 
I smoked my last cigar ! ’ ” 

Prudence sang in a deep bass that threatened to 
choke her. She grew red in the face, and did not 
try to go on any further with the song. 

Carolyn glanced at her and laughed. 

“ Somehow,” she said, “ I believe I thought Carls- 
bad would make you over.” 

“ You see I think I might have been made over if 


7 o 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


I had taken mud baths myself,” was the reply ; “but 
only seeing mamma take them didn’t seem to have 
much effect, — only to bore me almost to death. Did 
you ever notice that, after you have been bored to 
extinction, and have escaped, you are liable to com- 
mit very nearly anything ? You are so exhilarated, 
you know. Now I’m going to do something start- 
ling. I don’t know yet whether I shall steal the 
Ffolliott silver, or — ” here the girl paused to laugh 
— “or Carolyn Ffolliott’s lover. For the first I 
might be put in jail ; for the latter there’s no pun- 
ishment that I know.” 

% 

Prudence leaned back now and clasped her hands 
over the top of her head. 

“ I do wish you wouldn’t talk so ! ” Carolyn 
exclaimed. 

“Why ? It’s fun to take out the stopper and let 
yourself bubble over.” 

“ Prudence — ” 

“ Ma’am ? ” 

“ I want to ask you something.” 

“ Go right ahead. Questions cheerfully answered ; 
estimates given upon application.” 

But Carolyn hesitated. Then she said that she 
wished her cousin would be serious. 

“ Serious ! You don’t call me gay, do you ? Why, 


“/ WANT TO ASK YOU A QUESTION 7 1 

the solemnity that dribbled over me from mamma 
isn’t washed off yet. It will take a whole summer, 
and several men in love with me at once, and fight- 
ing about me, to take away the melancholy that I 
acquired at Carlsbad.” 

As she finished speaking, Prudence rose, and 
stepped out on to the lawn. She ran across it and 
leaned on the wall at the end of it. Beyond lay 
the bay, flashing brightly in the sunlight ; but her 
strong eyes did not blench as she gazed. 

“ Is that the Vireo in the sandy cove ? ” she 
asked. 

« Yes.” 

“ It’s a little thing, isn’t it ? ” 

“ Yes.” 

‘‘I believe I could almost manage that myself.” 

“ Yes.” 

Prudence turned towards her cousin, flung her 
head back, and laughed. A young man lying im- 
patiently on a bed in a room on the second floor 
heard that laugh, and tossed his head on the pillow 
as he heard. 

He inwardly compared the sound with Carolyn’s 
musical gurgle when she was amused, and then said 
aloud that it was amazing that he had ever fancied 
that he had cared for Prudence Ffolliott. She must 


7 2 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


be out there by the wall. He raised himself on his 
elbow, but, though he could look through the win- 
dow, he could see only the ocean and the sails on it, 
and the long trails of smoke from two steamers that 
were gliding away towards “the utmost purple rim.” 

That phrase came into his mind, and with it the 
memory of one evening, down on the beach, when 
Prudence had quoted that verse, and how her voice 
had sunk and thrilled as it pronounced the words and 
she had glanced up at him. 

What an ass he had been ! Well, he was thankful 
that was all over. It was incredible that he had 
been moved so by that woman. He was beyond all 
that now ; and he was in love with the dearest girl 
in the world. 

Prudence laughed again, and again Lawrence raised 
himself on his elbow, and once more saw nothing but 
the ocean and the sails. Then he turned with his 
back to the window, groaned by reason of his hurts, 
muttered something that sounded like “ Damn it,” 
and in a few moments fell asleep. 

Prudence still remained by the wall, her arms 
upon it and her brilliant face towards the sea. And 
Carolyn still sat in her chair on the veranda. She 
was not looking at Massachusetts Bay, but at her 
cousin. She was wondering about her with an inten- 


“I WANT TO ASK YOU A QUESTION y 3 

sity that was almost painful. Among other things, 
she was trying to determine what it was in Prudence 
Ffolliott’s face that made it interesting, and that gave 
it something very much more effective than beauty 
of feature. It was a mocking, flashing, melting, fiery, 
tender face ; a face full of daring, of possibilities, and 
suggestions, and shadows, and brightnesses ; and it 
was unscrupulous, and passionate, and cruel, and 
selfish, and — 

Having thought of all these adjectives, Carolyn 
roused herself and smiled at her own folly, and told 
herself it was an impossible thing that any human 
countenance should be so contradictory. She recalled 
the story her own mirror told her. As for beauty, 
she possessed a share of that. 

This thought strengthened and comforted her. 
She left her chair and joined her cousin by the 
wall. Prudence put her arm about Carolyn, and 
the two stood in silence a few moments. The water 
before them was vivid, shining green and blue and 
purple; and it was just ruffled by a gentle east wind 
that made the whole world seem a bright, joyous 
place to live in. 

“ How many times I’ve thought of just this place 
on the Savin Hill lawn, and just this outlook over 
the bay ! ” 


74 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


Prudence spoke very gently, and sighed slightly 
as she spoke. 

“ Have you ? ” 

“ Indeed I have. What did you imagine I thought 
of in that dreadful hotel with mamma and the maid 
and the nurse and the peat and the water ? I had 
to think of something. And I wondered if I should 
ever sail in the Vireo. And now I mean to sail in 
her the very first minute I can manage it. I got me 
the loveliest sailor hat in Paris, and a ribbon with 
* Vireo ’ on it, and a yachting suit that looks as if it 
were made in Paradise. Yes, I sail the Vireo the salt 
seas over.” 

“ I didn’t know you went to Paris.” 

“ I did. I wanted some clothing fit for mamma’s 
daughter and your cousin to wear. And I’ve got it. 
You just wait and see. That’s why I was a little 
late in coming across. Oh, how divine that color is 
beyond Long Ledge ! Life is worth the living, isn’t 
it, Caro dear? Yes, it is certainly a blessed thing 
to be alive. This world is a beautiful place. Yes, I 
must go out in the Vireo this very day, even if the 
wind isn’t right for much of a sail.” 

Prudence leaned her head lightly on her com- 
panion’s shoulder while she recited in a half-voice 
and with exquisite penetrating intonation : 


“/ WANT TO ASK YOU A QUESTION” 75 

“ The day, so mild, 

Is Heaven’s own child, 

With earth and ocean reconciled. 

The airs I feel 
Around me steal 

Are murmuring to the murmuring keel. 

“ Over the rail 
My hand I trail 
Within the shadow of the sail ; 

A joy intense, 

The cooling sense 
Glides down my drowsy indolence. 

“With dreamful eyes 
My spirit lies 

Where Summer sings and never dies. 

O’erveiled with vines, 

She glows and shines 

Among her future oil and wines.” 

As she finished the lines Prudence lifted her head 
and smiled at her companion. 

That smile somehow made Carolyn’s heart sick, it 
was so softly brilliant. She had a wild notion, for 
the instant, that a woman who could smile like that, 
and whose eyes melted like that, was a woman to fly 
from across the whole world. 

“ Prudence — ” began Carolyn, as she had once 
before begun. 


76 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


This time Prudence did not say, “Ma’am.” She 
responded, “Yes,” in a half whisper. 

Carolyn stood up a little more erectly ; she felt 
her hands growing cold. She went on : 

“ I’ve often wondered how you happened to engage 
yourself to Rodney Lawrence.” 

“ I shouldn’t think you’d wonder about that, when 
you’ve just been and done the same thing yourself,” 
was the response. 

“ Now don’t be flippant.” 

“No, I won’t be. Go on.” 

“ Well,” Carolyn began again, “ perhaps I ought 
to say that I wonder how, having engaged yourself 
to Rodney, you could jilt him for anybody else in 
the world.” 

“ Not for Lord Maxwell ? ” 

“ Not for a thousand Lord Maxwells.” 

“ One is quite enough, thank you. Well, if I did 
wrong, I was speedily punished. I jilted Mr. Law- 
rence for his lordship ; his lordship jilted me for the 
brewer’s daughter. I notice that brewers’ daughters 
over in England get much more than their share of 
the male nobility.” 

“You said you wouldn’t be flippant.” 

“ So I did. Have you any more remarks to 
make ? ” 


“/ WANT TO ASK YOU A QUESTION ” 

“ Yes. I remark that I thought you were in love 
with Rodney.” 

There was now a short silence. Prudence was 
standing with her hands clasped among the vines on 
top of the wall in front of her. 

“ Did I seem so ? ” she asked. 

“ Yes.” 

Prudence turned still farther away as she an- 
swered : 

“ I was in love with him.” 

“ Oh, Prudence, you are certainly unaccountable ! ” 
burst out Carolyn. 

“That’s just what I think myself.” 

As she spoke, the girl turned back towards her 
companion and laughed. 

“ Oh, yes, I was certainly in love with him. The 
sun rose and set in his eyes for me ; I thought of 
him by day and dreamed of him by night*; when he 
looked at me I felt my heart give one delightful 
throb and then go on as if it were beating to deli- 
cious music. He was never absent from me really ; 
he — ” 

“ That’s quite enough,” interrupted Carolyn, 
harshly ; and she added, after a moment : 

“ I don’t believe one word you have said.” 

“ Why not ? ” Prudence lifted her eyebrows. 


78 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


“ Because if you had loved him like that you 
would not have thought of any one else.’” 

“ Pshaw ! While the fever was on, you mean.” 

“ Prudence, why won’t you be serious ? ” 

“ Because you are serious enough for two, — yes, 
for a dozen.” 

Carolyn’s face had been gradually growing white. 
She now walked away, following the wall and staring 
out towards the ocean. 

Prudence leaned forward on the wall, her arms 
extended over the thick green of the creeper that 
covered the stones. There was some new light in 
her eyes, but it was not easy to tell what that light 
meant. 

When Carolyn returned she met her gaze with 
frankness, and said : 

“Caro, what is it you want to say to me? You 
haven’t said it yet.” 

“ No, I haven’t. I’m trying to ask you a ques- 
tion.” 

“ Go on.” 

But the other girl still seemed to find extreme 
difficulty in saying what was in her mind. Finally 
she asked : 

“Are you going to try to win Rodney back to 
you ? ” 


“/ WANT TO ASK YOU A QUESTION 79 

There was something deeply piteous in Carolyn’s 
lovely face as she spoke ; a pain, a hope and doubt 
which made the tears rise to the eyes of her com- 
panion. 

“ You dear little thing ! ” cried Prudence. “ How 
ridiculous you are ! I couldn’t do it if I tried.” 

“Oh, I don’t know,” was the response. “ I wish 
you hadn’t come now. Mamma dreamed that you 
were drowned, and that I was glad of it. That was 
horrible. It frightened me. I remember how Rod- 
ney felt about you. It’s useless to pretend that I 
don’t remember, or that he is in love with me in 
that kind of a way. You’d find out all about it, and 
I may just as well tell you. I’ve loved him ever 
since I can remember ; I suffered when you and 
he were engaged ; but I meant to be reconciled 
to anything that would make him happy. You see, 
I want him to be happy, whatever happens — ” 

“You foolish thing!” here Prudence murmured. 
But the other did not seem to hear this exclamation. 
She went on : 

“ And if I didn’t think he’d be happy with me I 
never would have said yes to him, — no, not for any- 
thing in the world. I know he has a strong affec- 
tion for me, and I — ” The tender voice faltered 
for an instant, then went on. “ I love him beyond 


8o 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


anything I can imagine in this world or the next. I 
suppose I am wicked, and an idolater, and all that, 
but it’s the truth, and I can’t help it. Now are you 
going to — are you going to be very, very kind to 
him ? You know you almost broke his heart once, 
and now I think you might let him alone. Will 
you ? ” 

Instead of replying immediately, Prudence hur- 
riedly passed her hand over her eyes ; then she 
said, lightly : 

“ I don’t think you have any idea how much 
breaking a man’s heart will bear, and ‘ brokenly live 
on.’ ” 

She smiled as she made the quotation. 

" You needn’t answer me like that,” said Carolyn. 
“I suppose men’s hearts are something like the 
hearts of women, after all. But we won’t discuss 
that. I want you to reply to me. I’ve talked so 
frankly to you because I thought on the whole I 
would do so. I was determined that there should 
be no misunderstanding. Now, what are you going 
to do ? ” 

“ Nothing.” 

“ Do you mean it ? ” she asked, eagerly. 

“ Absolutely nothing, — save to look on, when I 
can’t help it, at this beautiful drama of love — ” 


“/ WANT TO ASK YOU A QUESTION” 8 1 

“ And you are not going to flirt with Rodney ? ” 
Carolyn interrupted. 

“ No,” the other said, firmly. 

Carolyn drew a deep breath; then she laughed. 
“ I know Fve been talking in the most ridiculous 
way possible,” she said; “but no matter. I had a 
desire to have you give me your promise, and you 
have. But you needn’t think I don’t know exactly 
how foolish I’ve been ; because I do.” 

As Carolyn finished speaking she came to her 
cousin’s side and took her hand for an instant. 
To her surprise, she found it as cold as her own, 
though the sun was shining hotly down upon the 
two. 

“ If I were a man,” began Prudence, “ and saw 
two girls like you and me, I shouldn’t look at me, I 
should just go and fall in love with you.” 

“ No ; you wouldn’t do any such thing ; you’d 
think — oh, I know what you’d think. Oh, dear!” 
she partially turned towards the house, “is that 
Leander’s voice ? There’s no one in the universe 
but a boy who can be in all places at once. I 
thought he had gone fishing. Leander,” turning 
and speaking with some asperity, “ I thought you 
had gone codding.” 

“You must be a fool, then,” promptly replied 


82 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY- 


Leander, coming forward with his hands in his 
pockets. “ I ain’t goin’ coddin’ with the sun like 
this, ’n’ the tide like this, ’n’ late as this, I tell you. 
What you two been talkin’ about ? ” He scanned 
the faces before him, squinting his eyes almost shut 
as he did so. “I declare, you look exactly as if 
you’d been tellin’ secrets. Have ye ? ” 

“Yes, we have,” answered Prudence. 

Leander came yet nearer. He reached out one 
grimy hand and took hold of his sister’s skirt and 
pulled it. 

“Tell me,” he said. “It’s such good fun to have 
a secret. I know two of the cook’s and one of that 
new chambermaid’s.” 

“Then you know enough.” 

“No, I don’t, either. I never tell on one if I 
promise, you know ; but I scare ’em half to death 
sayin’ I will tell if they don’t do so and so, you know. 
There’s the cook, now. She’s got so she makes my 
kind of choc’late cake ’bout every day’ ’cause she 
thinks if she don’t I’ll tell mariner something she 
did one time when you were all gone.” 

Here the boy laughed, and danced a short shuffle 
on the close-cut grass. 

“ You’re a low-bred little cad, then,” said Carolyn, 
so sharply that she rather wondered at herself. 


“/ WANT TO ASK YOU A QUESTION.” 83 

Leander stopped dancing. His face grew very 
red. 

“You dasn’t say that again!” he shouted. “I 
guess you wouldn’t say such rotten, nasty things if 
Rodney was here. You’re as sweet as California 
honey when he’s round. And I ain’t a cad. ’N’ if 
I am, who’s a better right ? ’N’ you’re a cad’s 

sister, then, — that’s what you are ! ” 

“ Welcome diversion ! ” cried Prudence. “ We 
were getting very tired of telling secrets. Where’s 
that tame crow ? I haven’t seen him yet.” 

But the boy could not answer. His face seemed 
swelling, his sharp eyes were filling. 

“ Leander, I beg your pardon,” hastily said his 
sister. 

“ I ain’t a cad ! ” said the boy, in a shrill quaver. 
“ Rodney told me I was real gentlemanly ’bout that 
reward.” Then, with a sudden fury, “ I hate you, 
Carolyn Ffolliott, ’n’ you needn’t beg my pardon.” 

Leander spun around, and hurried away. As he 
did so, a black speck appeared over the savin-trees* 


CHAPTER IV. 


“ I REALLY OUGHT TO HAVE BEEN AN ACTRESS.” 

Carolyn called imperatively to her brother to come 
back. Immediately after her call, Mrs. Ffolliott 
appeared on the piazza. 

“Caro,” she said, remonstrantly, “what have you 
been saying to Leander ? ” 

“ I’ve been calling him a little cad.” 

“ My dear ! How could you ? Now he’ll be some- 
where kicking and screaming, and probably doing 
himself an injury. How could you be so thought- 
less ? ” 

The girl made no reply ; but Prudence ventured 
to suggest that if Leander was screaming at the 
present moment, he would be heard plainly in 
the part of the world where his mother and sister 
were standing. 

Mrs. Ffolliott twisted her hands together. “ Le- 
ander is so sensitive,” she said, pathetically. 

By this time, Carolyn had started forward to 
84 


“I OUGHT TO HAVE BEEN AN ACTRESS 85 

find her brother. But she paused, at her cousin’s 
exclamation : 

“Why, here’s Devil now. And why has he a 
cord tied to his leg?” 

The black speck that had sailed up over the 
savins gently descended and alighted in front of 
Prudence. It was a glossy black crow, that now 
immediately pulled up one foot, cocked its head on 
one side, and gazed knowingly at the girl, as she 
extended a finger towards it. 

It looked at the finger, and drew back a little, as if 
it had said, “ No, you don’t ! ” 

Prudence laughed. She was glad to laugh. 
She wanted to stretch up her arms iif her relief. 
She had hardly known how great had been the 
tension upon her in these few moments with her 
cousin. 

“You’d better tell Leander you’re sorry,” called 
Mrs. Ffolliott to her daughter; “and I wish you’d 
be a trifle more careful — ” 

Here she was interrupted by a whoop from some- 
where, — reenter Leander at a full run. 

“ I say ! ” he yelled, “ Devil’s gnawed his cord. I 
was punishin’ him. I say, sis, have you been ’n’ 
done anything to him ? Oh, there he is ! He’s got 
to catch it for this ! ” 


86 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


The boy. threw himself forward with his hands out 
to seize the cord that extended from the crow’s leg 
over the wall and off to the top of the nearest tree. 
But, as the tips of his fingers touched the string, 
Devil gave a hoarse caw, and sailed off towards the 
water. 

Leander shrieked out, “ Oh, darn that Devil ! ” hit 
his toe on a bat he had left on the lawn, and fell for- 
ward with great force on his nose, which immediately 
began to bleed profusely. 

Then there was running to and fro by the three 
women, and a demanding of lint, and alum, and this 
thing and that, by Mrs. Ffolliott. She looked with 
terror at the stream of blood that poured from that 
small nose. 

As Carolyn had often said, her mother was fright- 
ened when Leander was well, fearing he might be 
ill, and when he was ill, being sure he was going to 
die. 

As soon as Leander could speak, he demanded 
cobwebs. He said that cobwebs were to be stuffed 
into his nose, and he should immediately die if this 
remedy were not applied. 

“ Does he think we have our pockets full of cob- 
webs ? ” asked Prudence, in so light a tone that the 
boy, as he half lay in his mother’s arms, kicked one 


“ I OUGHT TO HAVE BEEN AN ACTRESS . ” 87 

leg violently in resentment, and said indistinctly that 
he wished Prue’s nose bled worse ’n his. 

“Thank you,” sweetly responded Prue ; “then we 
could bleed and die together, and there’ d be no more 
worry about us.” 

This the boy also resented as savoring of mockery, 
and he kicked again. Mrs. Ffolliott was actually 
weeping by this time, lest her son should do himself 
an injury. She begged Prudence to be careful ; she 
asked / her not to speak again, for she might inad- 
vertently say something that dear Leander might 
not like. 

Upon this Prudence turned and walked away, but, 
at the end of the piazza, she paused to inform the 
group assembled that she was going to the barn, for 
she was positive she had once seen cobwebs in the 
roof of the hay-loft. 

She did go to the stable, and climbed into the 
mow, but by the time she had reached the door by 
which hay was put in, she forgot all about Leander 
and his nasal hemorrhage. The door was open, 
and there was the sea but some rods away, with no 
intervening wall in front. The building stood on a 
bit of rising ground, and the girl looked on a short 
stretch of glittering sandy beach. She sat down on 
the threshold, her feet hanging out. 


88 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLL.Y. 


Aftej* she had gazed intently for a few moments, 
she exclaimed aloud : 

“It's just the place for a soliloquy. Enter the 
heroine in a white cycling suit, having come for 
cobwebs. Why, yes, it was cobwebs I came for. 
But I’m not a cat, and I can’t go up into the peak 
there after them. No doubt Leander will presently 
stop bleeding, and, if he doesn’t, there are already 
more than enough boys in the world.” 

She glanced up into the roof, a half smile on her 
face. Then she resumed her gaze at the sea, swing- 
ing her feet outside the door as she did so. 

“ I always did think soliloquies were great fun,” 
she said, aloud, “particularly if it’s the heroine who 
is doing the talking. Now, I suppose I’m the hero- 
ine at Savin Hill ; if I’m not, I mean to be, somehow. 
It’s always best to be the heroine if it’s possible. A 
second fiddle has its uses, but it’s pleasanter to be 
first fiddle. I should just like to ask what you 
expect of a girl who has been a Carlsbad nurse for 
months, — expect of her when she gets out, I mean. 
You expect some kind of a fling, don’t you ? Very 
well ; all right ; I don’t think you’ll be disappointed. 
Just wait until the folks begin to come here, and 
until I begin to wear my new frocks. Of course 
Rodney Lawrence can’t be counted now. He’s out 


“/ OUGHT TO HAVE BEEN AN ACTRESS.” 89 

of the running. He is going to marry Carolyn 
Ffolliott, and be adored all the rest of his life. At 
forty he’ll be a fat, self-satisfied wretch. 

“ I hope there isn’t anybody near enough to hear 
me. 

She looked about the big chamber, which now had 
very little hay in it. She inhaled the air, which was 
odorous with the ocean smell and the fragrance of 
a thicket of wild roses which grew among the rocks 
in front of the barn and slightly to the left. No- 
where do wild roses grow more rankly, more 
beautifully, than on the New England coast ; the 
keen salt wind seems to stimulate them to a greater 
loveliness. 

She leaned back again upon the side frame of the 
door, and resumed her gaze at the sea. She had 
discontinued her monologue. 

A sail came floating along around the point of 
rocks that guarded the northern side of the cove. It 
was a small craft, a tiny, sky-blue yacht, in which sat 
one man holding the tiller as he leaned back in a 
half-reclining position, his eyes scanning the shore, 
but scanning it lazily, and not as though he expected 
to see anything familiar. The wind was light and 
puffy, and sometimes the boat seemed as if it would 
stop, swinging slowly over the waveless water, 


90 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

“I could manage a boat like that well enough,” 
Prudence said to herself, “ and it would be great fun, 
too. 

“ I heed not if 
My rippling skiff 

Float swift or slow from cliff to cliff ; 

With dreamful eyes 
My spirit lies 

Under the walls of Paradise.” 

Having repeated the lines, she suddenly leaned for- 
ward and said, “ Ah ! ” with a quick, keen interest. 

The man in the boat was looking at her ; he took 
off his cap and waved it. 

He seemed to be a very tall, athletic person, 
wearing white trousers, a blue sack coat, and a white 
cap. He had thick, light hair very closely cut, long, 
light Dundreary whiskers, a smooth chin that was so 
markedly retreating that it apparently required cour- 
age to refrain from allowing it to be covered with 
a beard, prominent blue eyes, short upper lip, and 
extremely white teeth. This newcomer was suffi- 
ciently near the shore to permit all these items of 
personal appearance to be noted. 

“ May I land, Miss Ffolliott ? ” he called out. 

“ I don’t know why not. But Pm not the owner 
of the beach here,” she answered. 


“/ OUGHT TO HAVE BEEN AN ACTRESS” 9 1 

In response the man laughed. The next moment 
he had half reefed the single sail. He took the oars, 
and brought the boat crunching on the sand ; he 
flung out the anchor, and then leaped after it, 
pressing it down with his foot. Then he stood up 
and looked at the door of the barn, where Prudence 
still sat in the same position. She had watched his 
movements, a half smile on her face, her eyes nar- 
rowed to two glittering lines.” 

“This is jolly good luck, isn’t it?” he asked. 
Then he hastily added, “For me, I mean. When 
did you come?” 

“This morning,” she answered. 

“ Oh, I say, now,” he continued, “ isn’t this jolly, 
though ? Are you going to stay long ? ” 

“All summer, if I feel like it.” 

“ I say, now, are you really ? ” 

“Not really, but apparently, you know. Really 
I shall be somewhere else.” 

The man laughed delightedly. 

“ May I come up there in that hay-loft ? It is a 
hay-loft, isn’t it ? ” 

“Yes, it is a hay-loft ; but it isn’t mine, any more 
than the beach is mine.” 

“Then I shall come.” 

He ran up the steps two at a time. Miss Ffolliott 


92 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


shook hands with him without changing her position, 
save to reach forth a hand negligently. He sat down 
at the other side of the doorway. He looked out at 
the sea. 

“Jolly kind of a prospect, isn’t it ? ” 

“Yes, if one likes salt water. How came you 
over here ? ” 

“ Came in the Cephalonia .” 

« When ? ” 

“Two weeks ago.” 

“ You look very well. Did the mud baths cure 
you ? ” 

“ I suppose so ; anyway, something cured me. 
I’m as fit as a man need be.” 

“Why don’t you say ‘as right as a trivet ? ’ ” 

“Didn’t think of a trivet. Isn’t it jolly to see 
you, though ? ” 

“Thank you.” 

The two gave one full glance at each other, then 
Prudence laughed. 

“ Why do you laugh ? ” he asked, in an aggrieved 
tone. 

“ I don’t know unless it’s because your conver- 
sation sounds so familiar.” 

“ Well, laugh if you feel like it : I know con- 
versation isn’t my strong point.” 


“7 OUGHT TO HAVE BEEN AN ACTRESS” 93 

“ I know it isn’t.” 

“I say, you’re not very polite.” 

“ And you’re not very polite to tell me I’m not 
polite,” she retorted. 

The man laughed again, and began, “ I say, 
now — ” when Prudence interrupted him. 

“ Don’t tell me it’s jolly to see me.” 

“ No, I won’t ; but it is — ” 

‘‘There, you are at it again ! ” 

“ Oh, I beg your pardon.” 

The newcomer threw his head back and laughed 
once more. His companion did not join him. She 
gazed at him with apparent seriousness. When he 
had ceased laughing, Prudence inquired : 

“ Did Lady Maxwell come over with you ? ” 

Lord Maxwell’s face grew more grave. 

“ Yes ; we took the trip for her health. The doc- 
tors said a sea voyage would tone her up, so we 
came over here. And now they’ve sent her to the 
Sulphur Springs. I’ve just taken her there. Her 
mother’s with her, you know, and her maid, and her 
mother’s maid, and somehow it seemed as if I’d 
better take a run round over the States, you know.” 

“ Is Lady Maxwell’s health improved ? ” 

“ I can’t exactly tell. Some days she seems better, 
and then she’ll be all down ; malaria, you know.” 


94 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


“No, I didn’t know.” 

“ Yes ; had Roman fever once, so her mother says. 
Wasn’t treated right. I say, is this what they call 
Massachusetts Bay ? ” 

Lord Maxwell swept out his arm towards the water. 

“Yes, that’s what they call it.” 

The gentleman expatiated again upon the beauties 
of his surroundings ; he assured his companion that 
she must have no end of a jolly time, and then asked, 
with some abruptness, “ Any men here ? ” 

“ One now ; but a prospect of more.” 

There was a brief silence after this question 
and answer. Then Lord Maxwell exclaimed, “ I 
say — ” 

Prudence looked at him, a smile lurking about her 
lips and in her eyes. 

“ You’re always laughing at me, Miss Ffolliott,” 
he said, but his manner showed that the fact did not 
make him miserable. 

“ What were you going to say ? ” she inquired. 

“ Only that it isn’t a bad hotel over yonder where 
I’m stopping, and if you’d let me come here and call 
now and then, I’d stay there a week or two. Is this 
your Aunt Ffolliott’s place that you told me about, — 
that you called one of your homes ? ” 

“ Yes.” 


“/ OUGHT TO HAVE BEEN AN ACTRESS” 95 

“ Would she permit me to call ? ” 

“ Certainly. Any friend of mine would be wel- 
come,” with a little air of hauteur and distance. 

“ Oh, thanks. And now I suppose I must go.” 

He rose and looked down at her, as if he were 
hoping she would tell him not to go so soon. But 
she said nothing. 

“ I suppose you wheel ? ” glancing at her dress. 

“Yes, of course.” 

“ I might have known you would ; so do I. Per- 
haps you’ll let me take a spin with you ? ” 

“ Perhaps.” 

“ And you like sailing as well as ever ? ” 

“ Yes.” 

“Then I hope you’ll go out in this bit of a boat of 
mine ; she’s a real fine one ; and I like something I 
can manage all myself, so I got a small one. You’ll 
try her ? ” 

“ Perhaps.” 

“You don’t seem very eager.” 

“Don’t I?” 

“ No. And we’re old friends, aren’t we ? ” 

He asked the question with a wistful frankness. 
Before she could answer it, he went on in some 
haste : 

“ I never knew whether to believe you really when 


9 6 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


you told me you forgave me. You said you under- 
stood precisely how I was situated, and that you 
didn’t blame me, for you might have done the same 
thing. Do you remember ? ” 

“ Oh, yes, I remember all about everything. And 
I do forgive you.” 

“ I’m so glad ! And we are friends ? ” 

“ Yes, we are friends.” 

Prudence had risen to her feet now. Her eyes 
were raised to the face above her, and the man met 
a softly brilliant look that recalled the past vividly to 
him and made him think that he could not do better, 
since he must kill time some way, than to stay over 
at that seaside hotel, though he had been thinking a 
half-hour ago that he might as well move on. He 
was also telling himself that Prudence Ffolliott was 
more sensible than most girls ; she understood how 
a “ fellow might be obliged to do some things when 
he wanted to do other things ; ” this was the way 
Lord Maxwell put the case in his own mind. And 
she wasn’t going to lay anything up. 

He looked at her gratefully. What a fetching 
kind of a face she had ! He didn’t know whether 
there was a really pretty feature in it, but that didn’t 
matter. It had been a devilish set of circumstances 
that had obliged him to break off with her; yes, a 


“/ OUGHT TO HAVE BEEN AN A C TRESS. ” 97 

devilish set. He had done it as honorably as he 
could ; but he had never liked to think of his beha- 
vior at that time. It was such an immense relief to 
know that she didn’t bear malice. 

“ Well,” he said, abruptly, “ I’ll go now. Good- 
by.” 

He held out his hand, and Prudence put her fingers 
in it for the briefest space of time. 

He ran down the stable stairs and down the slope 
of beach. 

As he lifted his anchor to fling it into his boat, a 
crow flew down between him and the anchor, cawing 
as it flew. 

He started back with an exclamation. 

“ It’s only Devil,” called out the girl from the 
door, laughing gaily as she spoke. 

“ That’s just what I thought it was,” was the 
response. 

Lord Maxwell gazed an instant after the bird, 
which flew up to where Prudence stood and perched 
on the threshold beside her, curving its black neck 
and looking down at the man. 

Maxwell pushed out and spread his sail. At the 
bottom of all his thoughts concerning this meeting 
was a feeling of pique that, after all, Miss Ffolliott 
cared so little for his failure to marry her. But he 


98 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

ought to be glad of that. Did he want her sighing 
and dying for him ? 

He glanced up at the sail, which almost flapped, 
so light was the wind. He had stopped thinking of 
Prudence, and was now thinking of the woman he 
had married. His thoughts did not often linger upon 
that subject. He didn’t know of any earthly reason 
why they should. But just now he remembered with 
exceeding distinctness that Miss Arabella Arkwright 
had a thick waist and thick fingers ; that she had at 
first shown a very annoying inclination to call him 
“ my lord,” but, thank fortune, he had made her drop 
that ; and he was quite sure that she no longer referred 
to him as “ his lordship ; ” he was glad of that also. 
And she had greatly toned down in regard to her 
dress. There was no fault to find with her money, 
however. She had no end of it, — literally no end, 
Lord Maxwell was grateful to know. Even the pay- 
ment of his debts had not appreciably lessened the 
amount. 

It had been extremely jolly for the first six months 
for this nobleman to be aware that he had no cred- 
itors, and to have no fear that he should overdraw 
on his banker. But it was sadly true that even the 
novelty of having money enough for every whim 
began to be what he called “an old story.” He 


“/ OUGHT TO HAVE BEEN AN ACTRESS.” 99 

could get used to that, but he couldn’t quite get 
used to the fact that Arabella Arkwright was his 
wife. He knew she was not to blame for his having 
had to break with a woman he fancied, and who 
could amuse him, but he often caught himself feeling 
as if she were to blame. At such moments Lord 
Maxwell fiercely reproved himself for a low-bred 
wretch. He was “not much for intellect,” as he 
often said, but he thought he wanted to have the 
feelings of a gentleman, and to act like one. 

Prudence Ffolliott resumed her seat in the door 
of the hay-mow. Devil remained beside her. The 
cord which Leander had tied to its leg still dangled 
from it. Occasionally the bird pecked at the string, 
but he had not yet succeeded in detaching it. 

Now as he sat he would turn a bright eye towards 
his companion, looking as if he knew unutterable 
things about her, but would never tell them, never, 
never. 

She extended her hand and touched the top of the 
bird’s head with the tip of her finger. 

“You and I know strange things, don’t we, 
Devil ? ” she asked. 

Devil turned his head this way and that. He 
hopped a few inches nearer. 

“ Do you care for Rodney Lawrence, Devil ? Oh, 


IOO 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


you don’t ? Because he saved your life when you 
were just out of the shell ; and he tamed you ; and 
all you are you owe to him. You don’t care if you 
do ? All right. That’s like a human being ; that’s 
ingratitude. And you stole his ring from him, did 
you ? and hid it in the wall, and it wasn’t found until 
he didn’t care for it any more. No, he doesn’t care 
now.” 

Prudence rose, and walked about over the hay- 
strewn floor. Her cheeks had grown red. Her eyes 
had sparks in them. Suddenly she put her hands 
together, then flung them out with a dramatic gesture. 
Then she smiled. 

“ I really ought to have been an actress,” she said, 
looking at the crow, and speaking as if addressing it. 


CHAPTER V. 


BEING A CHAPERON. 

Rodney Lawrence decided that he would not 
stay in his room more than twenty - four hours. 
Therefore on the following morning he essayed to 
dress himself, and was much disgusted to find that 
somehow his head was odd, and that a general stiff- 
ness and soreness made him feel as he fancied a man 
of eighty years must feel. 

So he gave up the attempt. He donned a dress- 
ing-gown and put himself with some violence on a 
lounge near the window with a book in his hand. 
This he did for three consecutive days. 

Company had arrived meantime. The young man 
heard talking and laughing and singing and piano 
and banjo playing in the house, and apparently all 
about him. 

Once in the forenoon and once in the afternoon 
Mrs. Ffolliott paid him a short visit. She always 
told him she was glad to see he was improving, and 

IOI 


102 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


always asked if he wouldn’t like some calf’s-foot 
jelly. 

This morning, when she had made her customary 
visit, he had immediately volunteered this remark : 

“Aunt Tishy, I don’t want any calf’s-foot jelly. 
I never did like it, and I don’t like it now.” 

The lady had smiled in a somewhat vague manner 
as she patted the young man’s cheek in response. 
Then she said that Rodney was so fond of his 
joke. 

“ I suppose you’ll be down-stairs by to-morrow, 
won’t you ? ” she asked ; and this also was her 
customary question. 

Lawrence made an impatient movement. He was 
fond of Aunt Tishy, but he often wished she were not 
quite so inconsequent. 

“ I shall be down as soon as I can, you may be 
sure of that,” he answered. “ Are the same people 
here ? ” 

“Yes, but Mrs. Blair goes this afternoon. Good- 
by, Rodney dear. I’ll send you up a fine dinner.” 

Then Mrs. Ffolliott walked towards the door. But 
the young man recalled her. 

“ Aunt Tishy, where’s Leander ? He’s only been 
here twice, and he was on the wing then. He isn’t 
entertaining Mrs. Blair and the rest, is he ? ” 


BEING A CHAPERON 


103 


“ Oh, no.” Here Mrs. Ffolliott smiled approba- 
tively, as she often did when her son was mentioned. 
“ Lee says he’s in the chaperon business.” 

“ The chaperon business ? What on earth does 
he mean by that ? ” Lawrence tried to speak 
amiably. 

“ Why, he’s been boating and cycling with 
Prudence and Lord Maxwell a good deal.” 

Lawrence instantly averted his eyes from his 
companion’s face. His voice had a deeper note 
in it, though it sounded quite indifferent, as he 
said : 

“ I didn’t know Lord Maxwell was here.” 

“ Oh, yes ; that is to say, he isn’t here ; he is over 
at the Seaview. He’s stopping there, but he has 
been over here often.” 

“ Oh, he has ? And Lee is chaperoning Prudence, 
is he ? ” 

“ That’s what he calls it ; anyway, Prudence said 
of course she wasn’t going out alone with Lord 
Maxwell. She said it would bore her to death to 
go alone with him.” 

“ And so Leander goes to keep her from being 
bored to death ? ” 

** Yes. She says Leander makes everything 
amusing.” 


104 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


“ I wish, then, he’d come and amuse me. I don’t 
have even Lord Maxwell.” 

" I’ll tell Lee. You’ll be sure to be down 
to-morrow, Rodney ? ” 

So Mrs. Ffolliott swept out of the room. Law- 
rence turned again towards the window, magazine in 
hand. He seemed to read assiduously ; he turned 
over the leaves regularly ; his eyes ran along the 
lines scrupulously. 

Presently there came a soft tap on the door. 
Lawrence’s face brightened ; he dropped the book 
on the floor and rose laboriously. He went to the 
door and opened it. 

Carolyn stood there. She had on a hat and seemed 
in some haste. She carried a red rose in her hand. 

Lawrence seized the hand eagerly. He drew her 
in and kissed her. She glanced back through the 
open door along the hall. She blushed delightfully. 

“ You’re not afraid that some one will see me kiss 
you and thus know that you belong to me ? ” he 
asked, banteringly. 

“ It’s too much like a chambermaid to be kissed 
in the hall,” she answered, with a laugh. 

“ Oh, is it ? ” 

“But I’m not afraid that people will think I 
belong to you ; I’m — ” 


BEING A CHAPERON 105 

She hesitated so long that Lawrence drew her yet 
nearer, with a fine disregard of the open door. 

“ You’re what ? ” he asked. 

“ I’m proud to be yours.” 

Here she turned her face away and held up the 
rose to shield her, 

“ My darling ! ” he exclaimed. She glanced at 
him shyly. It was enchanting to see the lovely face 
so happy. 

“ Now I must go,” she went on, after a moment. 
“ They’re waiting for me. Oh, I wish you were able to 
come to drive with us ! You are truly much better?” 

“ Truly. I shall surely be out in a day or two. 
Stay one minute. Why didn’t you tell me Lord 
Maxwell was over at Seaview ? ” 

Carolyn flushed deeply, but she answered, promptly, 
“ Because I thought I wouldn’t recall anything dis- 
agreeable to you ; and I know he must be disa- 
greeable.” 

“ Pshaw ! What do I care about him ? Why, 
Carolyn,” his voice sinking to a tender intonation, 
“haven’t I got you to think of, to live for, now? 
What more do I want, and what can hurt me so long 
as I have you ? ” 

The young man’s face was full of a feeling that 
accorded with his words. 


io6 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


“ Carolyn ! ” called her mother from the lower 
hall. 

“ Let me see you once more to-day,” whispered 
Lawrence, and then the girl ran down the stairs. 

Lawrence hobbled back to his lounge again. He 
was thinking that he was the luckiest fellow in the 
world, and why shouldn’t he and Carolyn be married 
in the very early fall, say the first day of September ? 

He was still thinking this, when a sharp, fine 
rat-tat on the door made him call out : 

“ Come in ! ” 

Whereupon the door was opened and shut with 
great swiftness, and Leander Ffolliott advanced to 
the lounge. 

He was dressed in his suit as a member of the 
United States Navy, the same habiliments which 
he wore when we first had the honor of meeting 
him. He once explained why he liked these “ togs ” 
better than anything else he had, better even than 
the much-abbreviated cycling-suit, in which he 
looked like a mere atom of humanity. These, 
he said, were regular trousers ; they were not 
the “darn things that came only to his knees.” It 
will be seen that he was already looking forward to 
pantaloons. 

Leander paused near where Lawrence was lying. 


BEING A CHAPERON 


107 


He had his hands in his pockets, of course, and he 
was jingling jackstones industriously. 

“ Well,” he said, “ how does it go ? ” 

“ It doesn’t go at all,” was the response. Then 
Lawrence held out his hand and said, “ Shake, old 
fellow.” 

The boy extended a hand and grinned appre- 
ciatively. 

“ I s’pose you ain’t goin’ to be hauled up long ? ” 
he asked. 

“ I don’t know. I hear you’ve got a job. How do 
you like it ? ” 

“ What ? ” 

“ Why, being a chaperon.” 

Leander laughed shortly. He sat down on the 
edge of a chair. 

“ I tell you, ain’t Prue jolly ? ” he exclaimed. 

“ Do you find her so ? ” 

“ You bet I do ! No end. So does the Britisher.” 

“ The Britisher ? ” 

“ Yes, you know, — the lord fellow that’s got eyes, 
but no chin to speak of. You’ve seen him, ain’t 
you ? ” 

“ Never had that pleasure.” 

“ That so ? Thought you had. He’s in plain 
sight here a lot.” 


io8 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


“ He hasn’t been in plain sight much from this 
window,” said Lawrence. 

The boy looked at him keenly. “ Got a pain ? ” 
he asked. 

“ No. Why ? ” 

“ You spoke so sharp. I s’pose you ache a good 
deal ? ” 

“ Some. Are you always with Maxwell when he 
comes ? ” 

“ Lordy ! no, I ain’t. In the evening, if he ’n’ 
Prue are walkin’ round in the garden, I ain’t with 
’em then. But I’m along if they ride horseback, or 
go in the boat, — the Britisher’s boat, you know, — 
or wheelin’, and so on. Prue says I make things 
more interestin’.” 

“ Oh, you go to make things interesting ? ” 

“That’s about it.” 

Leander’s shrewd little eyes would roam about the 
moor and then come back to the face of the man on 
the lounge. He now added, “But I guess I don’t 
make things as interestin’ as Prue does.” 

“ I guess you don’t.” 

“ No, you bet. She’s a one-er for that, ain’t she ? ” 
he remarked, with animation. 

“ Yes, she is.” 

There was a short silence now, during which 


BEING A CHAPERON 


IO9 


Leander took a set of jackstones from his right 
pocket and began a game on his knee, getting no 
farther, however, than “two-sers,” as his knee was 
very small. 

Lawrence watched him. He was amused and in- 
terested. There were many questions he might ask, 
but he would not interrogate the boy, save in a 
general way. 

“The Britisher never wants to go back to his 
hotel,” at last remarked Leander. “ I don’t see why 
he stays at a hotel if he doesn’t want to stay. I say, 
do lords always have that sort of a chin ? ” 

“ I don’t know.” 

“And when they come over here, do they al- 
ways put their wives into some kind of sulphur 
springs ? ” 

“ I don’t know.” 

“ ’Cause that’s where his wife is, in sulphur springs, 
and it don’t do her any good, either.” 

Lawrence burst into a laugh, and, after staring an 
instant, Leander joined him shrilly. 

After that the conversation turned to other sub- 
jects. Leander gave a detailed account of how his 
nose was finally stopped from bleeding, and informed 
his friend that, though his mother was scared almost 
to death, he himself was not in the least alarmed. 


I IO 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


Having exhausted this subject, he went to the window 
and immediately cried out, “ There’s Devil ! Do you 
know what I’m doin’ when I ain’t chaperonin’ ? ” 

No, Lawrence did not know. 

“ I’m teachin’ Devil to carry letters, - — just as if he 
were a carrier-dove, you know.” Here he chuckled. 
“ You oughter have heard Flora Blair sing, ‘ Oh, 
carry these lines to my lady-love ! ’ ” 

Leander raised his voice to a high squeak and shut 
his eyes languishingly as he mimicked the singer. He 
opened them again and continued : 

“ She said ’twas an old song, and, oh, wasn’t it 
lovely? Her singin’ that made me think of havin’ 
Devil learn, you know. I tie a teenty bit of paper 
on his leg, and then — oh, I’ll tell you all about it 
some time. Prue’s helpin’ me. She says it may 
come handy when one of us is shut up in a dungeon, 
you know. Don’t you think so ? ” 

Lawrence nodded. His mind was hardly follow- 
ing the boy’s words now. There was creeping upon 
him a dull sense of dissatisfaction, he knew not 
why. 

Leander prattled on, the words sounding confusedly 
in the still room. At last Lawrence’s ears caught 
the sentence, “ For Caro wouldn’t let Lord Maxwell 
have the Vireo and take us all down to the Point of 


BEING A CHAPERON 


1 1 I 


Rocks. She was as silly as she could be, but she 
wouldn’t give in. When I asked her afterwards, she 
said the Vireo shouldn’t go out till you were able to 
sail her.” 

Lawrence inwardly called himself childish because 
of the warm glow that came to his heart as he 
heard. 

“ Bless her ! bless her ! ” he said to himself. “ She 
cares for me.” 

In two days more the young man was down-stairs. 
He still moved rather stiffly, but his face was radiant 
as he sat on the piazza with Carolyn. 

“ We’re going to have a long morning all by our- 
selves,” said the girl, but she had scarcely spoken 
when two people came strolling along in the shrub- 
bery at the left of the lawn. 

Lawrence did not suppress an exclamation of 
impatience when Prudence came in sight, followed 
by a tall man whom Lawrence had not seen. 

Prudence hastened forward. She came to Law- 
rence and held out her hand, looking up at him with 
a warm glance of delight. 

“ Welcome, Mr. Lawrence, welcome ! ” she said, in 
a low voice. 

“ Thank you,” he responded, somewhat coldly. 

“ And so you’re really better ? ” 


I 12 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


“ Oh, I’m all right now. I suppose you have all 
been desolated by my absence.” 

Lawrence knew that these last words were in very 
poor taste, but an inexplicable bitterness in his heart 
made him say them. He tried immediately to laugh 
them off. 

“ Oh, yes,” returned Prudence, “ we have refrained 
from smiling, all of us, save Leander, who is a heart- 
less wretch.” 

Then she introduced the two men to each other, 
and they bowed stiffly, and Lord Maxwell said it 
must be no end of a bore to be shut up in a room ; 
he had tried it and he knew. 

Having said thus much, his lordship turned 
markedly to Prue. “ I say, let’s see what’s the 
matter with your wheel. You’ve forgotten all about 
it, you know.” 

As the two walked away, Lawrence avoided look- 
ing after them. He turned towards Carolyn, and saw 
that she had her eyes fixed upon Prue’s retreating 
figure. There was a look of anxiety on her face. 

“ Oh, I do wish she wouldn’t do so ! ” he ex- 
claimed. 

" Do what ? ” 

“ Why, go on so with Lord Maxwell. Of course 
everybody notices it.” 


BEING A CHAPERON 


113 

“ And his wife in sulphur springs,” laughed Law- 
rence. 

The girl glanced at him quickly, and then laughed. 

“That’s what Lee told me,” Lawrence explained. 
Then he added, with some edge to his tone, “ I sup- 
pose no one but an Englishman would have the 
courage to shave such a chin as he wears. Most of 
us poor men-folks would let a beard hide that. Why, 
it makes him look almost imbecile.” 

And again Lawrence had the unpleasant conscious- 
ness that he was speaking childishly. 

Carolyn leaned a little towards her companion. 
She smiled charmingly, as she said, in a bantering 
tone, “ Don’t let us care anything about the Maxwell 
chin.” 

Then they both laughed. 

It was an hour later in the day that Prudence, 
walking down towards the shore, came upon Law- 
rence, sitting on the ground, placidly smoking a 
cigar. 

She was alone, and she paused irresolutely, as she 
saw him. 


CHAPTER VI. 


THE EVENING BEFORE. 

Lawrence rose, and threw away his cigar. 

“ Where’s Carolyn ? ” she asked, quickly. 

“Called into the house. Where’s Lord Max- 
well ? ” 

“ Gone back to Seaview. It seems as if we ought 
to console each other, doesn’t it ? ” 

“Yes. But I won’t even try to make Maxwell’s 
place good.” 

“ Thank fortune you can’t ! ” 

“ Is that the way you speak of absent friends ? ” 

Prudence deliberately sat down in the shade of the 
tree near where Lawrence had been sitting. 

“ Let us converse,” she said. 

The young man resumed his position. 

“ No,” remarked Prudence, presently ; “ that isn’t 
the way I speak of absent friends. I don’t know 
that Lord Maxwell is a friend — ” 

“ What is he, then, I should like to know ? ” 


THE EVENING BEFORE. 1 1 5 

“ Oh, well, perhaps you may call him * first flirter * 
just now.” 

Here Prudence pulled a long blade of grass, and 
thoughtfully examined it. 

“ First flirter ? Ugh ! ” 

After this Lawrence kept silence, and the girl 
picked the grass to pieces. He glanced at her ; he 
saw that her face was softening in a way he remem- 
bered. He thought he would rise and walk away' 
then it did not seem quite courteous to leave her so 
markedly. 

“I hope you enjoy it,” he said, finally. 

“ Sitting here with you ? Oh, yes,” she replied, 
in a gentle voice, but with a quizzical smile. 

“ No,” he said, rather too forcibly ; “ flirting with 
Maxwell.” 

“ I don’t enjoy it at all,” she remarked, plaintively. 

“Then I’d be hanged if I’d do it ! ” he commented, 
emphatically. “ I suppose he likes it, though.” 

“ Rodney, please don’t talk to me so.” 

Prudence suddenly lifted her eyes, and looked at 
Lawrence. Her whole face seemed to quiver for an 
instant with some uncontrollable emotion. Then she 
turned her head aside, and was silent. 

Lawrence sat there rigid, waiting for the next 
words to be spoken. He did not intend to be the 


II 6 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

one to speak them ; but after a moment he said, 
slowly forming his sentence : 

“ I think a friend would advise you not to keep up 
this apparent intimacy with Lord Maxwell.” 

Prudence laughed, as one laughs who will not 
weep. 

“ One must do something,” she said. 

She did not glance at him now, but he looked at 
her, boldly and insistently. 

“ What do you mean ? ” He put the inquiry 
authoritatively. 

She turned still farther away. “ Do you require 
everything to be explained ? ” she asked, in a voice 
just audible. 

He hesitated. Then he answered, “ I beg your 
pardon. I require nothing.” 

She seemed to be waiting that she might have 
herself more under control. At last she said, “ I 
deserve that you should speak in that way to me.” 

Lawrence thrust his hands into the pockets of his 
loose coat. He could shut them fast there and no 
one would see them. 

“ Deserve ? ” he repeated. “ I don’t understand.” 

“Yes, you must understand.” 

The words were spoken softly and tremulously; 
but the head was still averted. Prudence now went 


THE EVENING BEFORE . 1 1 7 

on hurriedly, as if she could not speak fast enough, 
and as if she were saying something that had long 
been in her mind to be spoken. 

“ It must be right to tell you how I’ve suffered for 
my — my mistake — I could almost call it crime — 
of two years ago. I — I — oh, I have suffered ! ” 

The voice ceased, and the speaker covered her 
face with her hands. 

Lawrence felt his heart growing hot with the sud- 
den access of crowding emotions. He gave the girl 
one look, which took in the graceful, well-remem- 
bered figure, as if it were then and there being 
stamped afresh on his mind. 

“ Before you married and were happy with the 
woman you love,” Prudence now went on, quickly, 
“ I wanted you to say you forgave me.” 

“I forgive you,” he said, promptly, and with 
unnecessary distinctness. 

Prudence raised her head. Her face was wet, 
her eyes large and full of light. 

“ I didn’t mean to make a scene,” she said, still 
more hurriedly. “ I know you don’t like scenes, and 
I don’t like them myself. But I didn’t expect ever 
to see you alone again, and, happening to meet you, 
I had to tell you that I couldn’t live if you didn’t 
forgive me. You do?” 


1 1 8 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

“ Yes.” 

“ Give me your hand upon it.” 

Lawrence drew a hand from his pocket, and ex- 
tended it, grasping closely the hand Prudence placed 
in it. 

“ It’s a strong hand and true,” she said, smil- 
ing ; “ Carolyn will be happy. And she deserves to 
be.” 

Prudence withdrew her hand immediately.. The 
two sat in silence, both gazing straight ahead with 
a look in their eyes as if they saw nothing. 

“You will be so much happier with Caro than you 
would have been with me.” Prudence spoke quite 
cheerfully. “ I don’t suppose I would have been 
anything like a model wife, and Caro will be. She’ll 
be always wanting you to be comfortable ; while I — 
I shouldn’t have been so thoughtful, I’m afraid ; I 
should only have just — ” She stopped abruptly. 

Lawrence, with his face still straight ahead, 
repeated : 

“ Only have just — ” 

“Loved you,” — in a tone so penetrating and so 
sweet that the man who heard it looked like a stone 
man, in that he made no visible response. She went 
on directly, in a matter-of-fact way, “I mean, you 
know, if things had gone on as we once planned.” 



‘“I BORE YOU SO,’ 


SHE SAID.” 










































































THE EVENING BEFORE . II9 

“ If you had not jilted me.” 

“Yes.” She hesitated, and then said, “But you 
just told me that you forgave me.” 

« So I do.” 

“ You ought ; for if I had not done that, you 
wouldn’t now be engaged to Caro ; and you’ll be so 
happy with her.” 

Lawrence moved uneasily. He glanced about him 
indefinitely. It did not seem to him as if he could 
abruptly walk away from this girl. 

“ Are you very tired of me ? ” she unexpectedly 
inquired. “ Do you want me to go up to the house 
and tell Caro you are waiting here ? ” 

Here she laughed, the sound ringing out in the 
still air. But before he could reply, the girl had 
risen to her feet. 

Lawrence rose quickly also. “ Are you going ? ” 
he asked. 

“ I bore you so,” she said. She was standing 
before him, her hands clasped and hanging down in 
front of her. Her face was turned to him, but her 
eyelids were drooped. 

He gave a short laugh. He tried to speak, but 
his tongue blundered over the words. At last he 
said, constrainedly, “You speak that which is not.” 
Then he tried to laugh again. 


120 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


Prudence looked about her rapidly. She took a 
step nearer to her companion. 

“ It isn’t in the least likely that we shall ever be 
alone together again,” she said, in a half voice ; “ so 
why need we quarrel ? ” 

“ Why, indeed ? I have forgiven you, and we are 
going to be friends. Isn’t that our attitude towards 
each other ? ” 

Prudence clasped her hands. “ Oh, Rodney, 
you don’t forgive me, and you don’t like me any 
more ! ” 

He stood silent, grimly looking at the woman 
before him. 

“ I can’t go on with my life thinking you bear me 
ill-will, — I tell you I can’t ! ” she said. 

“ But I don’t bear you ill-will. If Lord Maxwell 
had not married some one else, do you think you 
would have experienced this access of repentance ? ” 

The instant Lawrence had spoken thus he would 
have given much to be able to take back the words. 
But the sting of bitter memory, the recollection of 
past suffering, overwhelmed him. 

Prudence turned so white that it almost seemed as 
if she would fall. But she did not fall ; she stood 
up straight and stiff. Even her lips appeared to be 
stiff, for she tried twice to speak before she said : 


THE EVENING BEFORE . 


I 2 I 


“Mr. Lawrence, will you give me that ring? 
Leander says you have it again.” 

For answer Lawrence put his thumb and finger in 
his waistcoat pocket, and drew forth a ring in which 
was set a large, dark red stone. He held out the 
trinket in silence, and laid it in the palm of the 
extended hand. 

“ I believe this is the end,” he said, after a 
moment. 

Her whole aspect changed in a flash. She smiled 
while she closed her fingers over the ring. She was 
glancing at some object behind Lawrence. 

“ It’s not the end,” she responded, in a low voice ; 
“it’s what I call the sequel.” Then, louder, “I’m 
glad you’ve come, Caro, for I don’t know what would 
have happened if we had been left to ourselves, Mr. 
Lawrence is that belligerent. We have quarrelled 
about everything we’ve mentioned.” 

Carolyn advanced along the path behind Lawrence, 
who, for the life of him, could not refrain from hesi- 
tating perceptibly before he turned. In the violence 
of the revulsion he could hardly breathe. What 
would Carolyn think of him if she saw his face, 
which he knew must tell her something, and which 
he was sure would tell the wrong thing ? And how 
odd in him to hesitate. 


122 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


There was Prudence strolling negligently away. 
Just now she reached a curve in the path. She 
paused and turned back. She waved her hand. She 
sang gaily : 

“ Oh, Love has been a villain 
Since the days of Troy and Helen, 

When he caused the death of Paris 
And of many, many more ! ” 

“ What good spirits Prudence has ! ” Carolyn ex- 
claimed, as she reached her lover’s side. 

‘‘Yes,” he answered; then the eyes of the two 
met, and the girl drew back somewhat. 

“ Has anything happened ? ” she asked, in a 
whisper. 

“Nothing, — nothing,” he returned, and then 
added, violently, “ I thank heaven that it’s you who 
will be my wife, — you, you, Caro, and no one 
else ! ” 

She shrank from him still more, but he caught her 
hands and insisted upon drawing her nearer. With 
her head on his shoulder she said, indistinctly : 

“ I hope, oh, I do hope, Rodney, that you are not 
making a mistake ! You’re sure, aren’t you ? ” 

“ Sure ? A thousand times sure,” he replied, 
eagerly. “ And why should we put off our marriage ? 
You haven’t any reason.” 


THE EVENING BEFORE. 


123 


“ Yes, I have ; a very strong one.” 

“ I doubt it ; and I shall not consider it.” 

“ I want you to be positive, sure beyond question, 
that you know your own mind.” 

“ Ah ! ” came triumphantly from Lawrence, “then 
we’ll be married to-morrow.” 

From that day the young man was possessed with 
the resolve that his marriage should not be deferred. 
And of course he won over Carolyn and her mother. 

Really, there seemed no need of delay. The two 
had always known each other ; they had sufficient 
means. 

So the day was set for the first week in September. 
Lawrence came and went in the very highest spirits. 
They were to start on a long journey, going in the 
Cunard steamer that sailed on the afternoon of the 
day. “We will be gone two years at least,” Law- 
rence said. “We’ll go everywhere and see every- 
thing. Nobody will ever be as happy as we will 
be.” 

And Carolyn was quite sure that no one was ever 
as happy as she was then. She wrote a long letter 
to Prudence, who was in Newport with her mother, 
who had come back from Carlsbad. She told her 
every detail. There was to be no wedding party, 
only just the family present ; mamma had insisted 


124 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY \ 


otherwise, but she and Rodney had overruled her; 
they, would probably never be married again, and 
they wanted things their own way. Only Prue and 
her mother must come. 

And so Prue and her mother came the day before, 
and were met by Lawrence, who was very thin, with 
black hollows under very brilliant eyes, and whose 
manner was full of spirit and gaiety. 

“ It is evident enough that Rodney is in love with 
you, my dear,” said Prue’s mother as she kissed her 
niece, “and you’ll be happy ever after, of course; 
and that’s the way things ought to be.” 

The marriage was to take place on the morrow. 
At eight o’clock on the night before, the family rose 
from the dinner-table. The two girls disappeared 
up the stairs. The mothers sat in the drawing-room 
over a fire of logs on the hearth, talking over, for the 
twentieth time, every detail of the next day. Had 
Caro really got everything in her trunks ? Was she 
to have the right wraps on board ship ? 

Lawrence went out of the house. He lingered on 
the piazza. He lighted a match and looked at the 
barometer. 

“ Set fair,” he said, aloud. He took off his hat 
and passed his hand over his forehead. 

“ That’s good,” he went on, still aloud ; “ I’m glad 


THE EVENING BEFORE. 


125 


it’s set fair. Caro ought to have everything fair; 
and I shall have fair weather, too, if I’m with her. 
There was never a luckier fellow in the world than 
I am.” 

He kept his hat off. He looked up at the spark- 
ling heavens as he said, reverently : 

“ Pray God I may make her as happy as she 
deserves to be ! ” 

He went on down the path that led towards the 
water, not minding much which way he was going. 
There was a brisk southwest wind blowing, though 
it was not cool ; rather there was a softness in the 
air, which was full of the noise of insects. 

All at once the young man turned with a distinct 
purpose towards the bay. He had thought of the 
VireOj which lay moored at the wharf in the inlet. 

“ I’ll go out for an hour in her,” he thought. He 
hastened across the field, and in a few moments was 
going down the slope of the shore. 

It was not a clear night, for clouds swept up from 
the south and hastened over the sky, so that the 
stars shone out only intermittently in the deep blue- 
black of the heavens. This was a wind to drive the 
Vireo at a fine pace over the bay. 

Lawrence was impatient to be off. As he unfas- 
tened the rope from the post on the wharf, something 


126 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


came pell-mell down the beach, clattering over the 
shingle and up to his side. 

“ Oh, I say ! ” cried Leander, “ is that you ? I 
didn’t know but it was some scamp goin’ to steal 
the Vireo .” 

“ Did you think you could help it ? ” asked Law- 
rence, as he flung down the rope. 

“ You bet. Goin’ out ? ” 

“ Yes. Why aren’t you in bed ? ” 

“ Bed ? Ain’t you green ? Guess I’ll go with you.” 
And Leander prepared to clamber on board. 

But Lawrence was not in a mood to hear the boy’s 
chatter. He reached forward and took hold of Lee’s 
jacket collar, lifting him back on to the wharf. 

“I’d rather be alone,” he explained; “and Aunt 
Tishy’d be sure to worry about you.” 

As he spoke he leaped into the boat and began to 
push it off from the planks. 

Contrary to Lawrence’s expectation, Leander sub- 
mitted calmly, not to say hilariously. He was heard 
to dance about on the wharf, and to laugh. 

“ Goin’ alone, are you ? All right ; go it. If you 
want any chaperonin’ done, just send a cable message ; 
money back if you’re not suited. Ta-ta ! Be good ! ” 

Leander sat down on the wharf and drew his knees 
up to his chin. In this position he pulled out of his 


THE EVENING BEFORE. 


12 7 


pocket two cigarettes which he had that day taken 
from Lawrence’s case. Then he took a match from 
another pocket and “ lighted up,” puffing so fast that 
he soon began to choke. 

Meanwhile, Lawrence, with the facility of cus- 
tom, and notwithstanding the darkness, had put up 
the sail, and the boat skimmed swiftly out over the 
water. 

There was a tiny cabin, a place only made for 
shelter in a storm. At the entrance of this cabin 
now a voice asked : 

“ Is that you, Lee ? How did you get the sail up 
without my help ? ” 


CHAPTER VII. 


“A BLESSED CHANCE.” 

When Lawrence heard that voice his hand sud- 
denly slackened on the rope and the sail almost 
swung loose. The boat wavered, then with a quick 
firmness his grasp on the tiller and rope strength- 
ened, and the craft gathered herself and darted for- 
ward, the water splashing away from her sides, the 
wind humming. 

Lawrence did not turn his head, and at first he did 
not speak. The sail and the darkness shielded him. 

“ I thought I heard talking,” went on the voice, 
“ but the wind blew so I couldn’t be sure. I hope no 
one knows about our lark. It would spoil the fun ; 
besides, they’d worry.” 

Silence again. The boat gained in speed as it left 
the shelter of the land. 

Was it a moment or was it a half-hour that passed 
before the voice said, sharply : 

“ Leander ! ” 


128 


A BLESSED CHANCE. 


129 


“ It’s not Leander,” was the just audible answer. 

To this there was no response for so long a time 
that Lawrence almost began to think that his sense of 
hearing had played him false. Had he really heard 
anything ? He made a great effort to become calmer. 
He had pulled the sail taut and fastened it. He now 
stood perfectly still, with the tiller in his hand. The 
boat was heeling over as she went on, the water hissing 
past her. He took note that the sky seemed to be 
clearing; the stars were brighter. 

He remembered that Leander and Prudence used 
to go out in the Vireo sometimes by themselves, for 
Prudence, as Carolyn often said, was better than most 
skippers, and Lee made a good second officer. 

After awhile Lawrence knew that Prudence had 
left the cabin ; he knew that she was standing close 
to him, steadying herself by the mast. 

“Sit down,” he said, with authority. 

She obeyed, placing herself in the stern-seat near 
where he stood. In a moment he sat down beside 
her. He wondered if he should think to hold the 
tiller, his surprise was so great. 

“ Did you know I was here ? ” she asked. 

“No. I felt a sudden wish to take a sail. I came 
down here ; I met Leander at the wharf ; I wouldn’t 
let him go.” 


130 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


“ You wanted to be alone ? ’ 

“Yes,” he said, with hesitation. 

A silence, and then Prudence exclaimed, “ Oh, 
how strange this is ! ” 

“ Yes.” 

Lawrence spoke mechanically. Presently he asked, 
“ Shall I put the boat about ? ” 

“I think you might better.” 

“Yes; of course we’ll go back directly.” 

Another silence. Lawrence made no movement 
to turn. Then he coldly suggested that, now they 
were out, they might as well run across the bay. 
To this there was no reply. 

After awhile Prudence asked softly, leaning near, 
that she might be heard, “ I hope you’re not too un- 
happy because you happen to be with me ; are you ? ” 

“No.” 

“ You know I’m not to blame. You know I didn’t 
plan it.” 

“ I know that.” 

The boat went on. Neither of the two spoke for a 
long time. Then Lawrence put a question. “ Are 
you miserable ? ” 

« No.” 

“ And yet I’m not Lord Maxwell.” 

“ Oh, please don’t ! ” 


A BLESSED CHANCE . 


131 

“ Prudence, give me your hand.” 

The girl’s hand, cold as an icicle, was reached 
towards him, and was instantly crushed in his. He 
must still hold the tiller with his other hand, must 
still think of his boat. 

“ Prudence — ” he hesitated. 

He heard her whisper, “ Rodney — ” 

Then he cried, “ Why did you do such a damnable 
thing ? Why ? Why ? We might have been two 
years man and wife. ” 

At first she made no reply. He felt her shiver, 
then draw nearer to him. 

The wind drove a blast towards them, and then 
all at once grew more gentle. 

“I was mad to do it,” she said, “and now I am 
punished, — punished cruelly, — and I shall suffer all 
my life. But you’re going to be happy. I’m glad of 
that.” 

There were pauses between her sentences. 

“ Shall you be glad to have me happy with some 
one else ? ” 

His voice had fallen to the cadence she remem- 
bered so well. • 

“ Anything, — anything, — so that you are happy.” 

She spoke passionately, and she sobbed heavily 
after her words. 


132 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


Lawrence drew himself away, as if by command of 
something outside of himself. Then quickly he came 
nearer. He put his free arm about her and kissed 
her ; he kissed her again and again, her lips respond- 
ing to his caress, touching his own as they had 
done — ah, how long ago was it ? It seemed as if 
time had been annihilated and he was back to that 
day when she had said she loved him. And how he 
had loved her ! — as the cataract rushes over the cliff ; 
the old trite comparison was the true one. At the 
meeting of their lips the torrent rushed over his soul 
again. What did anything matter, so that he had 
her again ? Her arms were about his neck, her face 
was against his. He heard her say, “ Dearest,” in the 
same tone in which she had first spoken it to him, 
more than two years ago, — the tone he had tried to 
forget. 

“ We are not to blame,” she said. “We didn’t try 
to meet. It was a blessed chance, — oh, a blessed 
chance ! And now we have met, how can we part ? ” 

She hung upon him. She seemed to have flung 
from her all the self-control which she knew so well 
how to maintain. 

It was as if her love had mastered all else ; 
Lawrence felt it to be thus. It was love for him, 
he felt, that was stronger than everything besides. 


A BLESSED CHANCE. 


133 


This conviction went to his head ; it made him long 
to forget the present, that was not hers, in that past 
which had been hers. 

And how strange, how unaccountable, that he 
should have found her in the boat. Was it a 
blessed chance ? 

Another and a wilder rush of wind ; a black cloud 
just overhead sent down a dash of wind, which 
ceased as suddenly as it began. 

It seemed to Lawrence that he had great presence 
of mind because he continued to keep control of the 
rudder. He tried to think as well as to feel, but his 
quick-coursing blood prevented thought. 

How could he ever have believed for one moment 
that he loved Carolyn ? Why, his whole heart 
belonged to this woman who was clinging to him as 
if it would be death to her to be put away. 

He wished to speak, to say something that he ought 
to say, but his voice stopped in his throat. 

The Vireo flashed by a dark body that had a light 
shining at its bows, — some ship swinging at anchor. 
Vaguely Lawrence heard a'man on the deck above him 
shout out something, he could not distinguish what. 

He and Prudence were flying through space — 
together. Then, still vaguely, and with a threaten- 
ing horror, he thought of that picture of Francesca 


134 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

and her lover flying always through trackless air, never 
stopping, gulfs below them, infinitude above them. 
They had supped full of love, and now — 

“ Dearest ! ” 

It was the voice of Prudence saying that word 
again. Lawrence wished to rouse himself to some 
sense of duty ; but duty appeared to be something 
indefinite and very far away ; and then perhaps he 
had been cherishing some old-fashioned, mistaken 
sense of what was duty. If that was so — 

“ Are you going to turn towards the shore ? ” 

Prudence asked the question as if she were speak- 
ing of a thing impossible to do. She was looking 
at him with eyes whose beauty and deep, seductive 
power he could perceive through the dusk. 

He held her still closer. 

“ Do you tell me to turn ? ” he murmured. 

He knew that she hesitated ; he felt a slight 
shudder go through her frame. Her very hesitation 
spurred him. 

“ If you tell me to turn,” he said, in the same half- 
tone, close to her cheek, “ I shall obey. But you will 
not tell me.” 

Silence. The spray from the waves sprinkled over 
the two. Far ahead, but growing brighter, a line of 
lights showed where the north shore curved. 


A BLESSED CHANCE. 


135 


Prudence pressed still nearer to him. 

“God forgive me!” she cried; “but I can’t ask 
you to go back.” 

“ And if we go on now, we shall not part again ? ” 
He spoke rapidly ; there was a note of desperation in 
his words which she perceived. 

“Go on,” she said ; “we will never part again.” 

She kissed his lips lightly, then put her head on 
his breast. 

“ God forgive us ! God forgive us ! ” Lawrence 
also cried ; and he added, as he held his burden 
tightly, “ I can’t let you go. No, not if heaven and 
hell tried to part us. Now you are mine.” 

But not all the intoxication of that moment could 
prevent the picture of Carolyn’s face from coming 
suddenly and clearly before Lawrence as he spoke. 
That once it came, then vanished. 

It was several moments before Prudence lifted her 
head and looked about her. 

The north shore had approached still nearer, — so 
near that her strong eyes could see bonfires on the 
beach, and children feeding the flames, and cottages 
behind, lighted up by the flickering brilliance. 

“ Where are you going ?” she asked. 

“ I don’t know. Wherever you say. Somewhere 
where there’s a clergyman who will marry us ? ” 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


136 

“ Yes. And we must make some definite plan.” 

“You make the plan.” 

“ I will try. As for me, I’d like to go on like this 
for days, driven by the warm wind between ocean and 
sky, and with no one but you, — no one but you.” 
She repeated the words in a tone just loud enough 
for him to hear. “ You love me, then ? ” 

“ Love you ? Do I not prove it ? ” he asked. 

“Yes, yes,” she cried, in that intense tone which 
seems the voice of passion itself ; “ and as for me — 
oh, I will also prove to you how happy you make 
me.” 

A short time after Lawrence rose ; he trimmed the 
sail. He looked at his watch ; it was ten o’clock. 
The breeze was abating, and he succeeded in keep- 
ing the match-flame ablaze as he examined the dial. 

“If the wind holds on at all,” he said, “we can 
make Salem, or some of those towns.” 

“ Why not Boston ? ” asked Prudence, who deftly 
helped her companion with the sail, or steered while 
he worked. 

He glanced towards her. They had lighted a lan- 
tern and fastened it in the bows. Its rays fell on 
the girl’s face. It was radiantly, excitedly pale ; the 
soft luminousness of it might make a man forget 
many things. 


“A BLESSED CHANCE . ” 1 37 

“ And the Scythia sails to-morrow,” she said. 

She spoke after thought ; she feared her words 
would hurt, but she had already roughly arranged 
her plan. 

It was the Scythia in which Lawrence had engaged 
passage for himself and wife. 

Prudence knew that he grew white, that he shut 
his lips tightly ; but she also felt sure that the plan 
would soon present itself to him as the most feasible. 
Lawrence would go abroad with his wife ; only his 
wife would not be Carolyn Ffolliott, but Prudence 
Ffolliott. 

In that case all arrangements were already per- 
fected. How could she have done better if she had 
known Rodney was coming down to the boat that 
night ? She was striving with all her powers to 
think clearly and to the point. 

She turned towards her companion and looked at 
him pleadingly, gently, and yet with power. Her 
face showed love, utter love ; and it was that love 
which he could not resist. 

“ Let it be the Scythia ,” he said, shortly. Then, 
with tender violence, “ Prudence, do you guess 
how I must love you ? Do you guess what you 
must be to me ? Good heavens ! I don’t know 


myself ! ” 


138 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

Before the girl could reply, in a lull of the de- 
creasing wind, some indefinite, curious sound was 
heard in the bit of a cabin. 

Lawrence started nervously. “ What can that 
be ? ” he asked, sharply. 

“ Rodney,” she said, persuasively, “don’t let’s be 
superstitious. That must be Devil.” 

“ That crow ? Is he on board ? ” 

“Yes; Leander brought him, for fun, he said; 
he wanted to find out if Devil had any sea-legs. 
The crow perched on the back of a chair and 
seemed to go to sleep. I suppose he has wakened 
now.” 

“ I don’t know what we shall do with him.” 

“ Let him loose before we leave the boat.” 

“But Aunt Letitia — they are attached to him.” 

“ He will find his way home. Don’t you know 
Lee has been drilling him, — taking him away and 
letting him go back, and tying a note to his leg? 
You need not fear; Devil knows enough.” 

At this moment the crow appeared in the narrow 
doorway, a ray of light striking him and bringing 
out his form in a curious, uncanny way. He made 
a harsh noise, lifting one foot as he did so, and 
looking first at Lawrence and then at Prudence. 

The girl held out her hand and exclaimed : 


u A BLESSED CHANCE .” 1 39 

“ Oh, you dear Devil, what are you thinking when 
you look like that ? ” 

Her light tone relieved the tension which both 
had been feeling. The crow hopped forward towards 
Prudence’s hand. 

“What if we tie a note to him?” she asked. 
“ Don’t you think we might do that ? ” 

Before Lawrence could reply, there was a loud 
shout close to them and above them — a sound of 
men swearing — a blow on the Vireo — a rush of 
black waters — another sound as of the coming 
together of heaven and earth — in the midst of it 
all a strange cry from the crow. 

Lawrence had caught Prudence in his arms. 

Presently he came to his senses and knew clearly 
that he was in the water, that Prudence was floating 
easily on his arm, that the Vireo had been run into 
and perhaps destroyed. 

“ Prudence,” he said, quickly, “ I’m sure they’ll 
pick us up.” 

“ Yes,” she answered, quite calmly, “ I’m sure 
they will.” 

It was a coastwise steamer, and almost immediately 
they saw her black bulk a few rods away ; and then 
a light fell on the water from a boat near, and a 
man shouted. Lawrence raised his own voice in reply. 


CHAPTER VIII. 


ON BOARD THE SCYTHIA. 

The two were lifted into the boat. They were 
shivering in the wind, but their eyes were on fire 
with the excitement of the last two hours. 

“ Don’t take us to that steamer,” said Lawrence 
to one of the men who was rowing ; “ put us on 
board something that will carry us to the land. We 
must be in Boston to-morrow. Must, — do you 
hear ? ” 

The young man spoke imperatively. He was 
possessed by an imperious longing to get to a 
clergyman, that he and Prudence might be married 
directly ; and they must embark on the Scythia. 
That was the one feasible thing to do, — the one 
thing now to which he would bend all his energies. 
He was burning to get to the shore. He thought 
he could almost attempt to swim there, — anything, 
rather than the perplexities and delays which would 
come if they were obliged to go on board that 
coastwise steamer. 

140 


ON BOARD THE SCYTHIA. 141 

“I can’t do it, you know. I can’t do it,” answered 
the man, “’less we happen to come upon somethin’. 
There’s the steamer hove to ’n’ waitin’. No, I don’t 
see how it can be done.” 

Lawrence was fuming. How was he going to 
bear any delays ? It was as if the very air he 
breathed were poisoning him until he could leave 
America behind him. He had a fancy that if 
America were only far away there would be no 
clouds over his sky. 

“ What’s that ? ” hurriedly asked Prudence, inter- 
rupting the man, who was again saying that “it 
couldn’t be done, nohow.” 

A tug was coming puffing and panting along, a 
little thing, dirty and reeling in a reckless way over 
the water, with three men in it, all of them, by the 
light of their lantern, gripping pipes between their 
teeth. 

“ Hullo ! ” shouted Lawrence, leaning forward. 
“ Fifty dollars if you’ll take two passengers up to 
Boston to-night.” 

“ Hey ? ” 

Steam was shut off, and the two crafts came 
alongside each other. Lawrence repeated his offer. 

“ Why, there’s a woman ! ” was the response. “ We 
can’t take no woman ; no ’commydations, no nothin’.” 


142 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


He replaced his pipe in his mouth and then said, 
“I don’t s’pose she could stand it.” 

“I sha’n’t mind,” said Prudence, quickly. “Rod- 
ney, we’ll go aboard.” 

As she rose, a little black shape, forlorn and 
draggled, came fluttering from somewhere in the 
rowboat and alighted on the girl’s shoulder. Her 
first impulse was to push the crow from its resting- 
place, but she restrained that impulse, and the bird 
maintained its position when she stepped into the 
tug, for she assumed that the master of it would 
take them to Boston. 

So in ten minutes from the time they had been 
picked up the two were steaming towards the city. 
One of the men had brought forward an old coat, 
which he offered to Lawrence, suggesting that he 
“wrap it around his wife.” 

Prudence appeared not to hear the words, but she 
drew the garment closely about her and tried not to 
shiver. Lawrence sat near her ; he put his arm about 
her and held her to him. Often he turned and looked 
down at her face, upon which the lamp shone. At 
those moments he told himself that he could not live 
without her ; that he had been insane to think he 
could do so. 

The little craft rolled and spun over the bay, 


ON BOARD THE SCYTHIA. 


143 


puffing, and reeking with odors of oil ; sometimes 
sliding down into black water as it came upon the 
wash of a big vessel ; but always it held on its way, 
and in an hour the lights of Boston began to show 
plainly, as the craft moved in and out among the 
shipping in the harbor. 

“ I wish that crow had not come,” exclaimed 
Lawrence once, when a hoarse murmur from behind 
Prudence came to his ear. 

Prudence smiled rallyingly. 

“ Are you going to be superstitious ? ” she asked. 

“No; but that crow is a link with Savin Hill. I 
want to forget that I was ever there.” 

The girl made a movement nearer her lover. 

“ I will help you to forget,” she said, with a glance, 
“or” — and she drew herself up slightly — “there 
is yet time to go back. Leander knows it was by 
accident we were on the Vireo. We can take a train 
from Boston out to Savin Hill, tell them about our 
accident, and all will be as before. You will return 
to your old life, and I, — God help me ! — I return to 
mine, in which I must never think of you. It is not 
too late, Rodney. Choose.” 

As she spoke, Prudence held herself aloof, looking 
at Lawrence. The crow crept out from behind her 
and hopped on to her knee, cocking his sharp eye up 


144 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


at Lawrence and making a chuckling noise as it 
did so. 

“ I have chosen,” he answered, in a whisper, “ and 
I would not go back. Do you think I could leave 
you, — you ? No, not though I were to go through 
even more dishonor to gain you.” 

The crow chuckled again. A dark flush rose to 
the young man’s forehead. 

“ I will throw him into the sea ! ” he cried, in 
a smothered voice. 

But Prudence stroked the bird’s head with her 
finger. 

“ No,” she said ; “ we will send him back to Savin 
Hill when it is daylight. He will go. And shall I 
tie a note for Aunt Tishy to his leg ? ” 

“No,” was the answer. “I don’t know yet that 
I want to send any word. Dear, let us cast the past 
behind us. Don’t let us refer to it. We begin to- 
night a new life. Oh, surely love will atone, my 
darling, — my darling ! ” 

“ If you are only sure you will be happy.” She 
was gazing up at him. 

“ Sure ! ” A tender fury was in his voice. “ Pru- 
dence, it is paradise to be with you.” 

So they sat beside each other in the dirty little 
tug, and murmured the extravagant words which are 


ON BOARD THE SCYTHIA. 


145 


not half enough extravagant, because no words have 
ever been made which do much more than hint at any 
height of emotion, be it what emotion it may. 

In Boston the two took a carriage at the wharf. 
Lawrence parted from his companion in the public 
parlor of a quiet hotel at the South End. He ex- 
plained briefly how they came to be in such a plight, 
and the matron of the house furnished Prudence with 
some garments until her own should be dry. 0;ice in 
her room, the girl called for pen and ink and paper. 

“ If Rodney will not write to them, I must,” she 
thought. 

Sitting at the table beneath the gas-jet, Prudence’s 
face showed pallid and weary, but there was an invin- 
cible light in her eyes, a crimson on her lips, that 
spoke of something besides fatigue. 

The crow was perched on the back of a chair near 
her. He had drawn one foot up in his feathers and 
closed his eyes. 

Prudence held her pen in her hand and looked at 
Devil. Then she laughed slightly as she said, aloud, 
“We made an odd group, didn’t we, Devil? No 
wonder the clerk stared. A drenched man and 
woman and a crow arriving at eleven o’clock at 
night, with no luggage. 

“ Will you go back to Savin Hill in the morning, 


146 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

Devil ? As for me, I will never go back. How 
could I ? And Rodney shall be happy. Oh, yes, 
he shall be happy ; for I love him.” 

She put the pen to the paper ; she wrote, “ Dear 
Aunt Letitia,” then her hand stopped. She sat look- 
ing forward ; there was a beautiful light upon her face. 

A clock struck somewhere in the building ; it 
struck twelve. The girl roused herself and looked 
down at the paper before her. 

“ After all,” she thought, “ why should I write ? 
How they will hate me ! Let Rodney tell them what 
he chooses.” 

She walked about the room for a few moments. 
She tried to lie down on the couch, but she could 
not remain quiet. A fire of memory, and hope, and 
a strange, indefinite fear were in her heart. Her 
pulses beat so heavily it was out of the question to 
try to rest. 

It seemed to Prudence that she recalled every 
word she had ever said to Carolyn Ffolliott. Plain- 
est of all she remembered how she had promised not 
to try to win Rodney back to her. What a ridicu- 
lous promise ! Could any one expect such a promise 
to be kept ? Absurd ! 

Prudence walked about the room again. She sup- 
posed it would be morning sometime. Sometime 


ON BOARD THE SCYTHIA. 1 47 

the hour would strike when she and her lover would 
be on the ocean and beyond recall. 

It was a strange thing that she could so clearly 
remember Carolyn’s honest eyes when she had asked 
for that promise. 

Prudence shook herself impatiently. Then she 
tried once more to write the note to her aunt. But 
she could not do it. She tore the paper across and 
flung it into the grate ; after this she began to walk 
again. The crow got down on the floor and hopped 
along behind her, sometimes pecking at the carpet. 
She turned to him in a kind of fury. She was wish- 
ing she had the courage to wring his neck. But she 
would make him go back in the morning. She could 
not have him with her. How bright his eyes were ! 
Now, as she gazed at him, she fancied his eyes said : 

“ You’re a liar ! You’re a liar ! ” 

Thank fortune, he could not speak. She would 
surely kill him if he could speak. But she had 
never killed anything yet, and it must be rather 
a dreadful thing to do. Still, of course, it could be 
done. Anything could be done. 

When it came to be three o’clock the girl was so 
exhausted that she laid herself on the bed and 
pulled the clothes up about her. As her fingers 
touched her throat she shuddered, thinking of how 


148 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

she could stop the crow’s breath. She had left the 
light burning, and she now lifted her head and 
glanced about. Yes, there was Devil on the back 
of a chair near the fire. She smiled. 

“ It is like Poe’s raven,” she murmured. “ Per- 
haps he will say ‘nevermore’ to me.” 

Then she resolutely shut her eyes, and was asleep 
directly. 

A few hours later, in the bright sunlight of a 
lovely September morning, Prudence scoffed at her 
fancies of the darkness. 

She was dressed in her own clothes, and was 
waiting for Lawrence. She had drunk a cup of 
strong coffee, and had been walking in the little 
park near the hotel. No one was out, apparently, 
save servants and market-men, and then a man or 
woman hurrying by With a satchel to catch a train. 

The crow had gone with Prudence. She had 
permitted him to go, hoping he would spread his 
wings and fly away. But no ; he hopped sedately 
behind her, and when she turned he blinked up at 
her mildly. Once she took him in her hand, and 
flung him up in the air, for that was the way she 
and Leander had taught him to fly off home. Now 
Devil flapped his wings obstinately, then alighted on 
the ground near her. 


ON BOARD THE SCYTHIA. 1 49 

Two or three children stopped to gaze at him. 
Prudence asked a boy if he would like to have a 
tame crow, but he promptly answered that his cat 
would eat it. 

Thus it happened that when the Scythia left the 
wharf that day, near a certain man and woman, who 
stood together on deck, there was a little black 
shape sitting on some luggage. One of the hands 
began to take up the bags. 

“ Hullo ! Where sh’ll I stow the bird ? ” he called 
out. 

Lawrence turned, and his face darkened. But a 
hand was laid softly on his arm. 

“Dear,” said his wife’s voice, “let us call the 
crow our mascot. Surely you can’t blame him 
because he won’t forsake us.” 

Then Prudence promised the man that she would 
pay him well if he would take care of Devil during 
the voyage. 

She glanced laughingly at her companion. 

“ I couldn’t give him away, he wouldn’t leave us, 
and I can’t kill him.” 

Lawrence’s face cleared. He put his hand over 
the hand on his arm. “ Nothing matters,” he said, 
in an undertone, “so long as we are together.” 


CHAPTER IX. 


“COLD PORRIDGE HOT AGAIN.” 

A small boy in a blue navy suit was running up 
the beach. The wind was blowing against him as 
he ran, and he frequently stumbled ; but he didn’t 
mind the stumbles. He was chuckling to himself, 
and, when he burst into the room, where his mother 
sat with her sister, his chuckle became a noisy laugh. 

“ Don’t laugh so loud, Lee,” said Prudence’s 
mother, holding up her hand. “I think I’m going 
to have a headache.” 

But Leander did not stop his laugh in the least. 
He came up to the hearth between the two women, 
and stood in front of the fire ; for there was a low 
fire, — “ to cheer her up,” Mrs. Ffolliott had said. 

“ I tell you, marmer,” he exclaimed, “ here’s a go ! ” 

Before he could further explain his remark the 
door opened again and Carolyn entered. She went 
up to her mother and sat down on a footstool by 
her, leaning on her lap. 

150 


“COLD PORRIDGE HOT AGAIN.” 1 5 I 

“I wanted to be with you, mamma, this last 
evening,” she said. 

Mrs. Ffolliott felt her eyes fill, but she spoke 
cheerfully. 

“ Where’s Prue ? ” she asked. She stroked her 
daughter’s hair. 

“Oh, she went out half an hour ago,” was the 
reply. “ She said she was so nervous she couldn’t 
stay in the house ; besides, she had an engagement 
with Leander. What are you here for, Lee ? ” She 
looked in surprise at her brother. 

“What you here for, yourself?” was the imme- 
diate response. Then the boy resumed his laugh. 
“Won’t there be a lammin’ s’prise on the VireoV ’ 
he exclaimed. “ I hope he’ll think she’s a ghost. 
But I got cheated out of my sail all the same, ’n’ 
the wind’s just whizzin’ good.” 

Leander glanced at his sister, and cried out, 
“What you lookin’ at me so for?” 

“ Is there any reason why I shouldn’t look at 
you ? ” she asked, calmly. 

“ No ; only you needn’t eat me.” 

Carolyn turned her eyes towards the fire and 
remained silent. A red spot came quickly to each 
cheek ; yet she could hardly have explained why her 
face should burn. And what was Lee talking about ? 


152 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


Why wasn’t he in his bed long ago if he wasn’t with 
Prue ? 

“ It’s too windy for you to go sailing,” said the 
boy’s mother. 

“Is it? You bet ’tain’t, then. And they’ll have 
a first-class breeze. The Vi' 11 go, I tell you.” 

“ Who’s gone ? ” 

Mrs. Ffolliott put the question with little interest, 
but she saw that her son wished to talk on the 
subject, therefore he must be allowed to do so. 

“Why, Rodney ’n’ Prue. ’N’ the joke of it is 
that Rodney didn’t know anybody was aboard, ’n’ 
all the time there was Prue in the cabin ; ’n’ Devil 
was there, too. Rod came rushin’ down, ’n’ I was 
goin’ to get in, too, ’n’ he said no, he wanted to go 
alone. ’N’ so I let him ; ’n’ I bet he’ll be frightened 
out of his boots, when Prue walks out. If she’s 
bright, ’n’ she is, she’ll come a ghost, or somethin’, 
on him. She could do that splendid. Couldn’t she 
do a ghost splendid, Caro ? ” 

“ Yes,” said Caro. 

Caro’s mother glanced at her smilingly ; the affair 
was a good joke to her also ; and how funny Lee had 
made it. Then she glanced again in a startled way. 
She leaned over and drew her daughter to her, but 
the girl would not lean against her. 


"COLD PORRIDGE HOT AGAW.” ' 1 53 

“ Carolyn,” cried her mother, in a sharp voice, 
“ what is it ? There’s something dreadful in your 
eyes ! It is like what I dreamed about you when you 
wished Prudence was drowned. You remember?” 

Carolyn drew herself up. She put a hand over 
her eyes for an instant. 

“Mother,” she said, reproachfully, “how can you 
be so foolish ? And you must have a very vivid 
imagination to-night. There’s nothing dreadful in 
my face, is there, Aunt Ellen ? ” 

Prudence’s mother smiled languidly and replied 
that Letitia was full of notions this evening. 

A strong rush of wind came shrieking about the 
house ; a puff .of smoke leaped out of the chimney 
across the hearth. 

“ Bully time for a spin in the Vireo ,” remarked 
Leander. “ It was kinder mean that Rodney didn’t 
let me go. Do you s’pose he’s found out yet that 
Prue’s on board, Caro ? ” 

The boy was rubbing his smarting eyes as he 
spoke. His sister had now risen ; she was standing 
by the hearth, with one hand on the mantel. She 
was telling herself that the first involuntary move- 
ment of her heart had been mean and disloyal, and 
she had thrust that emotion from her. Did she dis- 
trust the man to whom she gave herself ? And 


154 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY . 


Rodney did not know Prudence was on board. How 
ridiculous, nay, how dishonoring to her own soul 
had been that involuntary distrust ! 

“ Do you s’pose he’s found it out yet, Caro ? ” 
persisted Leander. 

“I don’t know, I’m sure — yes, of course. How 
the wind does blow ! ” Another gust came sweeping 
down from the land. 

“ Yes, bully. I say, you ain’t afraid, are you, sis ? 
They both know how to sail the Vi. I wonder how 
far they’ll go?” 

“ Don’t talk so much, Lee ; you confuse me.” 

Carolyn deliberately walked away from the hearth 
and to the door that led into the hall.. 

“ You’re not going out, are you ? ” asked her 
mother. 

“ Yes ; I want to go.” 

“ How can you ? Why, it’s a real September 
gale.” 

But Carolyn opened the door and went into the 
hall. She was followed by her brother, who flung 
open the outer door and ran out ahead. The two 
walked around to the south side of the house, where 
the wind swept in full force. But Carolyn was 
aware, in spite of her anxiety, that she had no real 
cause to fear for the safety of those on the Vireo , 


“ COLD PORRIDGE HOT AGAIN.” I 55 

since they knew how to manage a sailboat. The 
wind was off shore ; if it drove the boat, it would 
drive it out to sea. She herself had been out more 
than once in a wind like this. It was the return 
which was not so easy, or rather the return required 
a longer time. 

“ Let’s go down to the wharf,” suggested Lean- 
der ; and his sister was glad to go. The wind has- 
tened their steps. They stood a few moments on the 
narrow planking. The water was black before them ; 
the tide was coming in, but the waves were flattened 
by the southerly wind. 

“ ’Twas mean of Rodney not to let me go,” 
Leander repeated. This grievance seemed to grow 
upon, him. “ But he’ll find he isn’t alone, for all 
that,” he chuckled. 

Carolyn was thinking one thought over and over : 

“To-morrow we shall have left Prudence, — 
to-morrow we shall have left Prudence.” 

Then she suddenly stopped that iteration by tell- 
ing herself that it was true that Rodney no longer 
cared for Prudence. Had he not shown plainly 
enough that he had recovered from that infatuation ? 
Was it an infatuation ? How often we like to call 
the love which is not offered us, or which we do not 
quite understand, by that term ! 


156 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY . 


“ And to-morrow we shall be far away. I will 
make him happy. Surely, surely, God will let me 
make him happy.” 

The girl turned back towards the house. And 
now the wind seemed trying to take her up bodily 
and fling her into the sea. 

Leander struggled on beside her, talking, talking. 
She wished his tongue might be still for one 
moment. 

At last he dropped a little behind by the path 
which led to the stable. He shrieked after his 
sister that he was going to see if his ducks had got 
loose. 

Carolyn walked on, her body bent forward to 
meet the gale. Thus walking she came suddenly 
upon a man who was hurrying in an opposite direc- 
tion. 

He drew back, uttering an exclamation, and taking 
off his hat as he did so. 

Neither could see the other at first in the 
darkness. 

“Oh, I beg your pardon,” he said. “Is it Miss 
Ffolliott ? ” 

“It is Carolyn Ffolliott,” was the answer; “and 
you are Lord Maxwell ? ” 

“ Yes ; ” and then the gentleman hesitated. 


“ COLD PORRIDGE HOT AGAIN” I 5 7 

Even in the dusk, and notwithstanding her pre- 
occupation, Carolyn had the impression that Lord 
Maxwell was under some unusual excitement. 

“ May I walk back to the house with you ? ” 

Without waiting for her reply, Lord Maxwell 
turned, and the two went on. 

“ Miss Prudence Ffolliott is here ? ” 

There was a certain intensity in his voice which 
added to the girl’s emotion. 

“ Yes — no,” she answered, in some confusion; 
“ she is staying here, as you know, but just now is 
out in the Vireo .” 

“ When will she be in ? ” He put the question 
quickly. 

“ I don’t know.” 

Having given this answer, Carolyn expected the 
man to leave her immediately ; but he did not. He 
kept on beside her until they reached the piazza, 
where hung a lamp. By the light of this lamp Caro- 
lyn saw his face. She restrained any manifesta- 
tion of her surprise, but she asked, quietly, “ Are 
you ill, Lord Maxwell ? ” 

“ No, thank you, no.” 

He moved restlessly as he stood. His face was 
flushed to a deep red ; his prominent eyes had a 
strange fire in them. Carolyn’s instant thought was 


158 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

that he had dined, and had also drunk more than 
was usual with him. 

She was silent for an instant, then she said, 
“ Won’t you come into the house and see mamma ? ” 

He moved again. 

“ No, no,” he said, hastily. “ You are very good, 
but I can’t, really I can’t. I say, now,” he added, 
abruptly, “it’s too confounded beastly that Miss 
Prudence is gone, you know.” 

Yes, he had certainly been drinking too much. 
Carolyn drew herself up a little. She wondered how 
long he would stay. 

“ I’ve had a telegram, — Sulphur Springs, you 
know. Lady Maxwell worse, — not likely to live.” 

“ Oh, I’m so sorry ! ” 

“Eh? Oh, yes, of course, — sorry, you know.” 

The speaker pulled a handkerchief from his 
pocket and passed it over his face. 

“ It isn’t the least likely she’ll live,” he said, 
huskily. “ I’m going to take the next train, you 
know ; but I had time to come over here. I wanted 
devilishly to see your cousin, — oh, I beg pardon, I 
wanted very much to see her, you know. We’re old 
friends and all that, you know. When did you think 
she’ll be back ? ” 

“I don’t know.” 


“ COLD PORRIDGE HOT AGAIN.” I 59 

“ Hope she didn’t go alone ; dev — I mean, hard 
wind, you know. Is she alone?” 

“ No.” 

“ Who’s with her ? ” 

“ Mr. Lawrence.” 

Carolyn spoke with the utmost coldness, but she 
answered promptly. 

“ Lawrence ? Damn him ! What’s he — ” 

“ Lord Maxwell ! ” 

“ Oh, I beg pardon, — ten thousand times, I’m 
sure. Do forgive me! You see, Thorbury — know 
Sir Charles Thorbury? — has just come over, and 
he and two or three of us have been dining. And if 
I take a drop more ’n usual it plays the dev — it goes 
to my head. Beastly shame ! Do forgive me ! But 
I know what I’m about well enough ; I want to see 
the other Miss Ffolliott. I’d give a thousand pounds 
to see her ’fore I start.” 

Lord Maxwell drew out his watch and held it 
beneath the lamp. 

“ Jove ! I’ve got to go this very minute ! But you 
tell her, won’t you, Miss Ffolliott, that Lady Max- 
well’s very ill, — not expected to live, — Sulphur 
Springs no good, after all. Good-by. Wish you 
joy, — wish you joy. Forgot ’bout your marriage. 
Good-by.” 


i6o 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


Carolyn did not speak, and he walked away, — 
walked with perfect steadiness, though he had talked 
thus. In fact, he was as much affected by his 
sudden news as by his champagne. 

Carolyn remained a few moments where he had 
left her. She was thinking that if Lady Maxwell 
died, then surely this time Prudence would herself 
become Lady Maxwell. But how could her cousin 
consent to pass her life with a man like that. Good- 
natured ? Yes, perhaps, but a mere animal ? Then 
the girl caught herself comparing the Englishman 
with Rodney Lawrence. She always compared 
every man with Lawrence, much to the advantage 
of the latter. 

After a few moments Carolyn returned to the 
house. She walked restlessly up the stairs, and then 
into the tower which overlooked the ocean. She 
opened the window next the water and leaned out 
of it ; the warm air swept over her as it rocked the 
tower. How dark it was ! And to-morrow she was 
to be married. 

At that moment it seemed to her that she would 
never see Rodney again, — that on this night all life, 
that was really life, would stop for her. 

She roused herself quickly from such morbid 
fancyings. 


“ COLD PORRIDGE HOT AGAIN." l6l 

The rack of cloud was rushing over the heavens, 
the stars shining now and then between the dark 
masses. Carolyn’s gaze was fastened on the sea, 
which lay black and strangely still beneath the wind ; 
but a southerly wind was like a calming hand on the 
water of this part of the bay. 

“ There is not the least danger, — not the very 
least,” she said, aloud. “ They know how to manage 
a boat. Rodney will only go a little way. In an 
hour or two they will be back.” 

So the girl resolved not to yield to any such 
imaginings. She hastened down to the room where 
her mother and aunt still sat over the smouldering 
fire on the hearth. She walked calmly up to her 
mother’s side and resumed her place on the footstool 
by her. 

“ Have they come home yet ? ” asked Prudence’s 
mother. 

“ No ; it’s hardly time.” 

“There’s one consolation,” said the elder lady, 
“ nothing ever happens to Prue ; she’ll do the 
strangest things, and nothing ever happens to 
her. We needn’t worry in the least.” 

“ No, not in the least,” responded Carolyn. 

She sat at her mother’s feet and watched the 
ashes gather over the coals on the hearth. The 


1 62 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

women' talked fitfully, and the girl tried to listen to 
what they said. One of them recalled how nervous 
she had been when her own wedding-day had been 
set She said that, though she never doubted her 
lover in the least, she had a dreadful conviction that 
something would happen to keep him from coming 
to be married. Here the speaker laughed as she 
went on : 

“ My father said that if I had such an opinion as 
that of Leander Ffolliott I’d better never marry him, 
even if he did come.” 

“ But he was there, — he was not a minute late ? ” 
asked Carolyn, with uncontrollable interest. 

Her mother smiled at her, as she answered, com- 
placently, “ He was early ; of course he was early. 
But why do you look so pale, Caro ? ” 

Carolyn had no time to answer, for Leander came 
plunging into the room fresh from the pen where 
he kept his fowls. He announced that the wind 
was going down, and that it was time for " Rod ’n’ 
Prue” to be back. He was besought by his mother 
to go to bed, but refused utterly, saying that he was 
going to sit up for Prue. 

He threw himself down on the rug before the fire, 
and in less than five minutes was asleep. 

The three women sat on. Occasionally Prudence’s 


“ COLD PORRIDGE HOT AGAIN. " 1 63 

mother inhaled the odor from her vinaigrette and 
made some insignificant remark. She was evidently 
trying to keep awake. At last, when the clock 
struck eleven, she rose and said that she must try to 
be fresh for the next day, and that Prue was very 
thoughtless to stay out so long. 

Thus Carolyn and her mother and the sleeping 
boy were left in the room. The girl went herself 
and brought more wood, which she placed carefully 
on the coals, as carefully as if her own fate depended 
upon the sticks igniting. Presently the flames curled 
up about the fuel, licking the bark, with a purple 
light at the edges. 

Mrs. Ffolliott leaned back and dozed a little ; Caro- 
lyn gazed steadily at the fire. After awhile the 
clock struck twelve. 

The wind had subsided now, save for an occasional 
long-drawn moan about the house. 

Mrs. Ffolliott sat up straight. She tried to look 
as if she had not been asleep. 

“ Really,” she exclaimed, “ I must say that they 
are very thoughtless, very thoughtless, indeed. I 
wonder at them.” 

Carolyn made no reply. She did not change her 
position in the least. She sat with her arm across 
her mother’s lap, her face towards the hearth. 


164 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

“Yes,” Mrs. Ffolliott repeated; “I do wonder at 
them. Are you going to sit up any longer, Caro ? ” 

“Just a little while longer,” was the answer, in a 
quiet voice; “but you go, mother; you’ll need the 
rest.” 

“ No, no ; I’ll stay with you.” 

The speaker drew the afghan more closely over 
the boy asleep on the hearth. Then she put her 
head against the back of the chair and again fell 
asleep. 

When she had breathed heavily for a time, Caro 
carefully withdrew from her position beside her and 
walked noiselessly to the window. She flung aside 
the curtain and looked out* A heavy rack of cloud 
was in the east and south, but above the stars shone 
clearly. 

Carolyn stood with her hands pressed closely on 
her breast, gazing up at the heavens where the stars 
glittered. 

“ I must keep still, — still,” was her only coherent 
thought. 

At last she began to walk towards the door, going 
noiselessly, .lest she waken the sleepers. Silently 
she opened the door, and silently she closed it. She 
lingered a brief space, leaning against the wall and 
listening. 


“ COLD PORRIDGE HOT AGAIN.” 1 65 

“■They may be coming now,” she was thinking. 
She bent her head forward. Had she heard steps 
and voices ? 

No, she had heard nothing ; it was her own .fancy. 
Her temples were throbbing so that she could not 
hear plainly. 

She went on to the outer door. This had been 
locked and bolted. But she turned the key and 
drew back the bolt. When she stepped without she 
actually gasped in the intensity of her excitement. 
But she moved quietly, her lips held tightly together, 
her eyes gleaming, her face colorless. 

Once outside the door, she stepped off the piazza 
and began to run. She ran at the full speed of which 
she was capable ; but, curiously, she did not run 
towards the shore, but down the carriage-drive that 
led to the public highway. Once on the road, she did 
not slacken her pace until she was so breathless that 
she must pause. Then she stood still in the middle 
of the road, panting, but conscious of a certain relief 
from the tension that had been upon her as she had 
sat by her mother’s side. 

“ I could not have kept still one moment longer, 
— no, not one instant.” 

She spoke loudly into the silence of the night. A 
low wind sobbed through some birches near her. It 


1 66 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

was only a low wind now ; all violence had gone out 
of it. 

When Carolyn looked back upon this night, she 
always recalled precisely how the wind sounded in 
the birches as she stood in the road, struggling 
for breath after her run. There was a damp per- 
fume of rose-geranium clinging to her skirts, for she 
had trampled upon a shrub of geranium as she had 
once swerved from the path. 

She tried not to listen, but she could not help 
straining forward to hear something, though she was 
fully aware that she had come away from the shore. 
She was also fully aware that by this time Lawrence 
and his companion could easily have returned ; that 
is, if they had gone a few miles only, as was to be 
expected. 

They had gone farther. What was Prudence say- 
ing to Rodney ? What the tone of her voice ? What 
the glance of her eyes in the dusk ? 

“What? What?” 

Carolyn shouted out that word. She was almost 
beside herself, and, knowing this, she shrank back 
as she heard her own voice call thus into the dark- 
ness. 

“ I must be still, — still,” she said, again. “ If I 
give way, I cannot tell what I shall do.” 


“ COLD PORRIDGE HOT AGAIN” 1 67 

A pause, during which she listened. Then she 
said, with a terrible vindictiveness : 

“ I hate her ! hate her ! hate her ! ” 

There was a wild satisfaction in shouting this to 
the night. 

“ But how foolish I am ! ” 

She pushed her hair back from her face, and was 
startled to feel how burning hot her cheeks felt to 
her cold hands. 

Soon she turned and walked homeward, — walked 
soberly, as if she were thinking calmly of a subject 
indifferent to her. She went in at the door, which 
had been open, and softly entered the room she had 
just left. 

Her mother wakened and raised her head. 

“ They’ve come, haven’t they ? ” she asked. 

- No.” 

“ Oh, well,” she said, comfortably, “ I suppose 
they went farther than they intended ; but it was 
very thoughtless of them, — very ; and I shall tell 
them so. Don’t you think we might better go to 
bed, Caro dear ? ” 

“ You go, mamma ; do go,” was the girl’s response. 

“ Oh, no, not without you.” Mrs. Ffolliott leaned 
forward in her chair, looking into the fire. “ What 
curious things one will dream,” she said, with a 


i68 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


smile. “ I must have been asleep, for I wakened 
trying to think of the last two lines — do tell me, 
Caro : 

“ Cold porridge hot again, 

That loved I never — 

“ What is the rest ? It’s so annoying, a little thing 
like that. Can’t you tell me ? ” 

The girl stood behind her mother’s chair, and 
repeated, softly : 

“ Old love renewed again, 

That loved I ever.” 


CHAPTER X. 


THE PASSENGER LIST. 

All days and all nights pass, therefore this night 
passed. The first light of morning came palely in 
at the windows upon the two women who were still 
by the hearth. But Leander, when half awake, had 
been kind enough to yield to his mother’s entreaties 
at about two in the morning, and had allowed her to 
lead him to his room. 

After that hour Mrs. Ffolliott had not slept. She 
grew more and more alarmed. She fidgeted about 
from door to window, to the piazza, to the grounds. 
But Carolyn did not accompany her ; she sat by the 
fire, sometimes shivering as she crouched forward. 
Every few moments she repeated to herself the lines 
her mother had brought to her memory : 

“ Old love renewed again, 

That loved I ever.” 

It was one of the clearest, loveliest mornings of 
September. 


169 


170 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

“ They are drowned ; perhaps their bodies will be 
washed ashore. Oh, my poor Caro ! ” Thus Mrs. 
Ffolliott, embracing her daughter when she came in 
from the piazza. She continued at intervals to say, 
“ They are drowned ! They are drowned ! ” 

The servants rose and began gaily the duties of 
Miss Carolyn’s wedding-day, but directly they also 
were enveloped in the gloom. Prudence’s mother 
had an attack of hysteria as soon as she came into 
the breakfast-room, and it was Carolyn who led her 
back to her own chamber. It was Carolyn who 
organized what search was possible, and who sent 
out messages to towns along the shore. She did it 
persistently and nervelessly, her face coldly set, her 
voice clear and even. 

Her mother looked at her in helpless wonder ; 
her aunt repeated again and again that she wished 
she had as little feeling as Caro, but then too much 
feeling had always been her curse. Caro must “ take 
after” the Ffolliotts. 

On the morning of the third day Carolyn sent 
word to her mother that she would not be down to 
breakfast ; she thought she must have taken cold, 
and she did not wish anything sent up. So 
her mother presently appeared in her daughter’s 


room. 


THE PASSENGER LIST. I /I 

“ It isn’t a cold, it’s a fever,” the elder woman 
exclaimed, as she looked in the girl’s face. 

“Oh, no,” said Carolyn; “I’m not so lucky as 
that ; it’s only heroines who have brain fevers and 
die in such circumstances ; and I’m not a heroine.” 

She spoke the truth in part. She only had a 
lingering, low fever, from which she began to 
recover when the weather became frosty. 

It was when Carolyn was able to walk out upon 
the piazza that her mother told her that parts of the 
Vireo had been found and identified unmistakably ; 
they had been washed ashore a few miles down the 
coast. 

“ It’s no use hoping any longer,” she said. 

“ I don’t hope ; I haven’t hoped from the very 
first,” was the answer. 

There was something so strange in the .girl’s tone 
that her mother looked at her in a kind of terror. 

Carolyn, closely wrapped, was sitting in the sun- 
light on the veranda. 

« I don’t know what you mean,” said Mrs. Ffolliott, 
feebly. “ I’m sure I had the strongest hope for 
several days. It seemed to me they must have been 
saved somehow ; and Rodney was such a good 
swimmer.” 

“ So was Prudence a good swimmer,” said Carolyn. 


172 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

“ Yes, she was. But I don’t see what happened 
to the boat ; they were — ” 

“Mother,” said Carolyn, wearily, “don’t go on 
talking like that.” 

“ No, no,” the mother said, soothingly, but in a 
perplexed voice ; “ 1 won’t say anything. We have 
to bear whatever Providence sends upon us.” 

Carolyn suddenly sat upright in her chair. “ Do 
we ? ” she asked, fiercely. Then she made an effort 
to restrain her words. She sank back again upon 
the seat. “They are not drowned,” she said, calmly, 
as if merely asserting an evident fact. 

Mrs. Ffolliott came close to her daughter and 
gently stroked her forehead. 

“There, there,” she said, as if speaking to a child ; 
“we won’t talk about it.” Then she added, as an 
afterthought, “ But I’ve ordered the mourning.” 

“ The mourning ! ” 

Again Carolyn sat upright. This time she laughed. 
At that laugh the mother drew back a little. 

“ I tell you they are not drowned,” the girl repeated. 

“ Then where are they ? ” 

“ What does it matter where they are ? They are 
together.” 

“ Carolyn ! ” 

“ Yes, together.” 


THE PASSENGER LIST. 1 73 

“ Poor child ! Don’t let’s talk of this any longer. 
When you are stronger, your mind will be stronger, 
and you won’t have these fancies.” 

Carolyn did not reply to these words. She lay 
silently in her chair, gazing off to the line where the 
horizon met the ocean. 

She was thinking, suddenly, that it was here on the 
piazza that she had been sitting when Leander had 
found the ring that Prudence had given to Rodney ; 
and then Rodney had come and had asked her, 
Carolyn Ffolliott, to be his wife. 

Well, it was all over. But she would not put on 
black because her lover was faithless. 

As the weeks went on, nothing more was heard of 
the two who went out in the Vireo that night ; that 
is, nothing was heard by the people at Savin Hill. 
But they went nowhere, and saw only a very few 
friends ; and as the season grew on towards winter 
they saw fewer and fewer. The neighbors had gone 
back to their city homes. Prudence’s mother had 
left them for the South. 

Flurries of snow began sometimes to hide the ocean 
from the girl, who sat often at her chamber window. 
Then came three or four perfect days in November, 
the Indian summer. It was on one of these days that 
Mrs. Ffolliott entered the room where her daughter 


174 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


sat by the hearth. Carolyn was reading, or seemed 
to be reading. She held a book in her hand nearly 
always when she was not at work. 

Mrs. Ffolliott had a copy of a Boston daily paper, 
and the paper fluttered and rustled in her hand as she 
came forward nervously. 

“ Carolyn,” she said, in a high voice, “ you just read 
that ; you might as well read it first as last. The 
strange part of it is that we haven’t seen it before. 
Of course other folks have seen it. And they 
wouldn’t tell us. I call that unkind. I happened 
upon this paper in a waste-basket. It had never 
been unfolded. I don’t know what we’ve done to 
have such a thing happen to us. I’m glad you held 
out about not putting on black. How ridiculous we 
should have looked, going around in black ! ” 

While she talked Mrs. Ffolliott held the paper 
beyond her daughter’s reach, though the latter 
extended her hand for it. 

“ Let me see it,” said Carolyn, authoritatively. 

The mother hesitated an instant, then she put the 
paper on the girl’s lap and pointed to the list of 
passengers on the Scythia. 

“ Mr. and Mrs. Rodney Lawrence,” Carolyn read, 
then she read again. She heard her mother 
saying : 



“‘LET ME SEE IT,’ SAID CAROLYN.” 



THE PASSENGER LIST. 1 75 

“ It’s the same steamer and the same date that you 
were going with him.” 

Mrs. Ffolliott was not thinking of grammar as she 
spoke. 

Carolyn looked up, a hard light in her eyes. 

“ Only he married Prudence instead of me,” she 
said. “ It was a fine plan, wasn’t it ? No one 
could have made a better. Of course people hated 
to tell us. Oh ! ” 

She dropped the paper and clasped her hands. In 
a moment the hard look had left her face. Her lips 
quivered as she said, “ He always loved her ; he never 
loved me. No, he never loved me. Do you suppose 
he’ll be happy with her ? ” 

“ I’m sure I hope not,” was the angry reply, “and 
I don’t see how it’s possible, either. The scoundrel ! 
The ungrateful wretch ! ” 

“ Oh, mamma ! ” 

“ You don’t mean to say you’re going to defend 
him, Carolyn Ffolliott ! ” 

“No, no,” she said, in a low voice that trembled 
piteously ; “ but I can’t stop loving him because he 
doesn’t love me. You see, mamma, I’ve got to love 
him. Oh, I wish I hadn’t ! I wish I could thrust 
him out of my mind ! ” 

“ Got to love him ! ” cried Mrs. Ffolliott. “ Caro- 


176 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


lyn, I’m ashamed of you. I thought you had more 
spirit. Are you going to whine in this way ? Why, 
I’ll — I’ll have you shut up! Do you think I’d 
have gone on like this if your father had served 
me so ? ” 

The girl did not answer. She was sitting motion- 
less, with her hands lying inertly in her lap. 

Mrs. Ffolliott, in the suddenness of this discovery, 
hardly knew what she did. She grasped her daughter’s 
shoulder and shook it. 

“ Have some pride ! ” she exclaimed. 

But Carolyn did not resent the words or the touch. 
She was staring straight in front of her mother, a 
nerveless droop to her mouth, a touching despair in 
her whole aspect. 

“You are not going to go about wearing the 
willow, are you ? Oh, the scamp ! The villain ! ” 

The sharp voice echoed in the place. 

Carolyn now tried to rise. She turned indignantly 
to her mother, her eyes flashing. 

“ If you call him such names I’ll leave the house,” 
she said, firmly. 

“ Good heavens ! She defends him ! The vile — ” 

“ Mother ! ” 

“ Carolyn ! ” 

The girl asserted herself. She spoke with dignity. 


THE PASSENGER LIST. 


1 77 


“ You are speaking of the man who was to be my 
husband ; please remember that. And I love him ; 
remember that also. By accident he met that — 
that — ” her voice sharpened — “he met Prudence. 
She, of course, tempted him ; she would tempt an 
angel from heaven. And he loved her. It was all 
a mistake, his thinking he cared for me, — that is, to 
marry me. Now we’ve got to bear it. Prudence — 
but no,” coldly, “ why should I talk of her ? ” 

“You defend him!” Mrs. Ffolliott cried, with 
hysterical repetition. “ That a child of mine 
should — ” 

“ Mother ! ” said the girl again, “ we won’t talk of 
this.” 

“Not talk of this insult! — this — I say he’s a 
scamp, and he shall never come into my house 
again ! ” 

“He will probably never try. We shall never see 
him again. And he won’t be happy with her. Oh, 
I want him to be happy, whatever happens ! ” 

Carolyn said the last words as if she did not know 
she was not alone. Her face at that moment had a 
look of such fervid loveliness that her mother invol- 
untarily turned away as if from something sacred. 


CHAPTER XI. 


A KNOCK-DOWN BLOW. 

After this Carolyn refused to talk of Lawrence or 
Prudence. She immediately decided to go back to 
their city house and go on with the winter precisely 
as usual. 

Mrs. Ffolliott made two remarks, and then 
dropped the subject. One of these remarks was, 
“ I can’t tell how thankful I am that we didn’t put 
on black, though I should have done it if you hadn’t 
stopped us, I must say.” The other was, “If your 
father had been living, Caro, things wouldn’t have 
happened like this ; ” though how Carolyn’s father 
would have prevented these things from happening 
was not explained. 

The girl and her mother went everywhere and 
received the same as usual. After their five hundred 
friends had looked at Caro in great but partially con- 
cealed curiosity as to “how she took it,” they all 
tried to act as if nothing had happened, and most of 
178 


A KNOCK-DOWN BLOW. 1 79 

them conceded that it was wise of Miss Ffolliott to 
go right on with her ordinary life. 

Some of them remarked, “ But there is a curious 
look about her eyes, isn’t there ? I suppose she really 
cared for that man.” 

One afternoon in January, while Carolyn was in 
her own room, her furs still on, for she had just come 
in from a walk, a servant brought her a card. As she 
read “ Lord Maxwell ” on the pasteboard, her face 
changed. She hesitated an instant, then she said, “ I 
will go down.” 

The gentleman was standing by the hearth ; a 
thick yellow beard covered his chin, and this change 
so improved his appearance that Carolyn was surprised 
almost into doubting his identity. 

“ It’s so good of you to see me,” he began, “ so 
awfully good, you know.” 

She held out her hand. She was trying not to be 
agitated. It seemed to her that she was very weak 
because at sight of this Englishman her pulses began 
to flutter. She sat down on one side of the hearth ; 
he continued standing. He laughed slightly, and 
said he believed he was getting nervous ; he’d rather 
stand; no, on the whole he’d sit. So he sat down 
also. 

“I say, Miss Ffolliott,” he spoke hurriedly, “I 


i8o 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


hope you’ll pardon me for calling, you know. I was 
going to be in town, and I hunted up your address. 
Is — is your cousin, Miss Prudence, with you ? ” 

“ No.” 

Carolyn found it at first a simple impossibility to 
add more. The very strength of her wish to give 
the information concerning her cousin in a matter-of- 
fact way prevented her from doing so. 

Lord Maxwell leaned forward with his hands on 
his knees. His large, prominent eyes were fixed 
on the fire. 

“ You were anxious about Lady Maxwell when 
I saw you last,” now said Carolyn. 

“Yes; I remember. She died; yes, she died, 
you know.” The gentleman sat up straight. “ We 
did everything we could, but it wasn’t any use. I 
didn’t feel like going back to England. Her mother 
went. I’ve been out to the Rockies ; been hunting 
no end, — big game, you know ; but, somehow, I 
didn’t care much. My wife was a good woman, 
Miss Ffolliott.” 

Carolyn made an inarticulate murmur in response. 

“Yes,” he went on, “I came right here. Thought 
I’d call and see old friends, you know. Made sure 
you could tell me where Miss Prudence Ffolliott is. 
Can you ? ” 


A KNOCK-DOWN BLOW. l8l 

i 

“No.” And again the girl found it almost impos- 
sible to go on. But this time she did continue : 
“ Prudence married Mr. Rodney Lawrence, Lord 
Maxwell. They never came back that night. I 
wonder you had not heard ? ” 

The young man rose to his feet, but immediately 
sat down again. His face grew red, and then pale. 
He opened his lips to speak, and presently said, 
“ Haven’t seen a paper ; haven’t heard any news. 
By Jove ! ” 

The exclamation came harshly, — so harshly that 
he immediately begged pardon. 

He sat gazing intently into the fire. It was 
really painful to witness his struggle towards com- 
posure. As for Carolyn, she was wondering now at 
her own calmness. She was thinking, “ He loves 
her, too.” 

Then she fell to wondering what Prudence would 
think and feel when she knew that now, by her own 
act, she had missed a brilliant marriage, for the 
second time had missed a peerage. But below every- 
thing in her mind was the keen, insistent question, 
“Why do they love her so ? ” 

Lord Maxwell evidently tried to rouse himself. 
He looked at the girl opposite ; something in her 
face made his eyes grow dim. He wanted to speak ; 


182 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


his thoughts groped for words that should express — 
what ? His mind was in a painful confusion ; he 
hated to suffer as he was suffering now. And this 
girl who was looking at him, — how kind she was ! — 
and, by Jove, she had just been going to marry Law- 
rence ! He had forgotten that at first. What a 
cursed muddle it all was ! Had she cared, too ? 
But women were so strange, and proud, and — All 
at once Maxwell was pouring out hurried words, 
having a confidence that this girl would not scorn 
him, would be kind, and he must speak to some one ; 
a man couldn’t hold his peace when such *a thing as 
this had happened. And he had been sure that 
Prudence would engage herself to him, and they 
would be married as soon as it was respectable. 
Hadn’t she jilted Lawrence for him ? Hadn’t she — 
but what had he done himself ? And now he won- 
dered if she had loved Lawrence all the time; but 
surely she had loved him, Maxwell, when — He 
wanted to swear again. 

“ Here I’ve been thinking of her every minute,” 
he burst out, — “ thinking of her when I ought to 
have remembered my wife. But I didn’t care ; I 
didn’t care for anything but to get a smile from 
Prudence. Damn it ! Oh, do forgive me, Miss 
Ffolliott ! A man doesn’t know what he’s saying. 


A KNOCK-DOWN BLOW. 


183 


And when Lady Maxwell died, I wouldn’t write ; I 
was bound I’d wait till I came back here, you know ; 
I resolved on that, — kind of penance, and that sort 
of thing, and — ” 

“ It was too late. Lord Maxwell,” interrupted 
Carolyn, coldly, “already too late before you had 
joined your wife.” 

“ Was it ? ” Maxwell was now walking about the 
room, his hands in his pockets. “ I’ll wager ten to 
one you think I’m a fool to care so, and so I am. 
But what’s a fellow to do ? I tell you I’m hard hit, — 
devilishly hard hit, — beg pardon.” 

“ Men seem to be fools about Prudence Ffolliott,” 
remarked Carolyn ; “ she seems to be that kind of a 
woman.” 

Though she spoke in a very quiet voice, hearing 
her own tones made her shrink from herself in a 
contemptuous surprise. Had she fallen so low as to 
allow herself to speak thus ? She would have given 
much to recall her sentence. She drew herself up 
with some haughtiness as she added, “ Please forget 
that I used such words. Naturally I don’t like to 
think of my cousin. I will say to you, Lord Max- 
well, that you are not the only one who has suffered 
by reason of that woman.” 

Carolyn succeeded in pronouncing the words “ that 


184 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


woman ” in an entirely neutral tone. Having done 
so, she immediately fell to despising herself for hav- 
ing said them at all. They seemed to her far be- 
neath her own ideal of what she ought to be. In the 
sudden stress of her penitence and pain she leaned 
forward and made a gesture for her companion to 
stop in his walk. 

“ Lord Maxwell,’' she said, tremulously, “ I don’t 
mean to bear malice, or to judge. How am I to 
know the strength of temptation which besets some- 
body else ? I am always praying to be forgiven. 
The seeing that you suffer — yes, it must be that — 
makes me talk to you in this way, though I don’t 
know you much, — though — ” 

Her voice trembled into silence. Her eyes, dim 
with tears, were lowered. Lord Maxwell seized her 
hand ; he held it fast in both his own for an instant. 

“ By Jove ! ” he exclaimed, “ you’re a good woman ! 
I wish I’d known a woman like you years ago. I 
did have a sister, but she died ; somehow a fellow 
can’t get on if he doesn’t have a good sister, or know 
some woman like you.” 

He paused and dropped her hand. Two tears fell 
from his eyes to his cheeks. He took out his hand- 
kerchief and openly wiped them away. 

“ I’m a regular donkey, don’t you know ? ” he said ; 


A KNOCK-DOWN BLOW. ' l8$ 

“ but you can’t tell what it is to me to see a woman 
like you. I knew there must be such women some- 
where ; and I’ve had such a load of things on my 
mind lately. And I’ve been wishing I’d tried more 
to make my wife have a better time ; but I couldn’t 
get Prudence out of my mind no way. Fact is, she 
bewitched me. And I counted on finding her now, 
and — and — well, you see, hearing she’s married 
was a regular knock-down blow, — took the stiffening 
right out of me. So I’ve been and behaved like a 
baby, — and I an Englishman ! ” 

Here the speaker smiled in a doleful manner. 
Then he turned towards the door. “ I believe I’ll go 
now ; might as well. Good-by, Miss Ffolliott.” 

He turned back again, shook hands, and then 
walked out of the room. 

Carolyn remained in her chair by the fire. She 
leaned her h*ead back and closed her eyes. Her 
features gradually became as calm as if they did not 
belong to a being who could be happy, and who could 
also suffer. 


CHAPTER XII. 


“ don’t be cruel to me.” 

“ Did you bring my wrap, — the gray velvet ? ” 

The man addressed slightly raised his arm to 
draw attention to the fact that he was carrying a 
garment. 

“ Oh, thanks. Is there anywhere to go this 
morning ? ” 

“ I thought we were to sit somewhere in the old 
fort. You signified a wish to that effect.” 

“ Did I ? If I’ve signified a wish, do let’s carry it 
into effect. We will sit on the water-battery, then ; 
though I’ve noticed that only lovers sit there.” 

The man made no reply. The two walked across 
the Plaza, mounted the sea-wall, and were presently 
established on the battery, apparently absorbed in 
gazing across the Matanzas River out towards the 
open sea. 

“ Shall we play we are lovers ? ” asked Prudence, 
after awhile, turning to her husband with a smile. 

1 86 


“DON'T BE CRUEL TO ME." I 87 

“ I’m afraid the attempt will be too great a strain 
upon you,” answered Lawrence ; but he smiled back, 
and leaned a trifle nearer his companion. 

She turned her eyes away immediately, and seemed 
to drop the idea of playing at lovers. 

Lawrence’s figure stiffened slightly as it withdrew ; 
but he said nothing until he took a cigar-case from 
his pocket. Then he remarked : 

“ I’m so glad you don’t object to smoking.” 

“ But it seems coarse to go beyond cigarettes,” she 
answered. 

“ Does it ? Then you are not coarse yet.” 

“ Thank fortune, no. I wonder if Leander has 
learned to chew tobacco.” 

No reply. Lawrence smoked slowly, gazing in- 
tently at a large yacht that was just entering the 
river. 

“ Four months is a tremendous while, isn’t it ? ” 
Prudence put up her hand to yawn behind it as she 
spoke. 

“That depends,” said Lawrence, gravely. 

“ On what, for instance ? ” 

“ On the degree in which you are bored.” 

“ Ah ! Well, there’s something in that, Rodney. 
But tell me truly, how long does it seem to you since 
we were married ? ” 


1 88 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

“ Precisely four months and three days and a 
half.” 

“ You are nothing if not accurate, dear.” 

She put up her hand and yawned again. 

“Accuracy is something,” he returned. 

He was holding his cigar in his hand now, and 
looking down at the red tip with the utmost apparent 
interest. 

After a short silence, Prudence said, “ I wish you 
happened to have a cigarette about you, Rodney.” 

“ I have. Your case is in my pocket.” 

She held out her hand. “ Give me one, then. I 
didn’t know this water-battery was so deadly dull.” 

Lawrence made no movement to accede to her 
demand. He flung away his own half-burnt cigar. 

“ Give me one, please.” 

“ No. I prefer that you shouldn’t smoke here in 
public.” 

“ Oh ! ” 

Her eyes narrowed as she looked at her husband ; 
then she burst into a light laugh, and turned to look 
again at the river. Lawrence glanced at her, then 
he, too, gazed at the water. 

A little shallop shot into sight close to the battery. 
It was rowed by a man who looked up and saw the 
two. He lifted his cap ; he stared persistently at 


“DON'T BE CRUEL TO MET 1 89 

the woman, his eyes showing an open admiration. 
Then his boat glided on towards the wharves. 

“ Is that Meramble ?” 

“Yes; quite an Italianized-looking man, isn’t 
he?” 

There was a slight access of color on Lawrence’s 
face, but his voice was perfectly even in its lightness, 
as he responded : 

“ Was that an Italianized stare he gave you ? ” 

Prudence shrugged her shoulders ; and that was 
the only reply she made to the question. 

More boats and more yachts came by. Some- 
times there was waving of hats and handkerchiefs 
from those on board to the two on the battery. 

“ We must look quite a Darby and Joan,” remarked 
Prudence. 

“ Quite,” said Lawrence. 

Again Prudence turned her eyes quickly on her 
husband. Then she asked : 

“ Do you remember what Mr. Meramble sang at 
the Ormistons’ last night ? ” 

“ No.” 

“I do; it was so cute. You were close to the 
piano ; you ought to remember.” 

“ I recall Mr. Meramble’s shirt-collar and his tie, 
but not his song.” As he spoke, Lawrence laughed. 


190 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


It must be confessed that his laugh was extremely 
irritating. 

“ Listen,” said Prudence. 

Then, in a veiled, sweet voice, she sang : 

“ Can you keep the bee from ranging, 

Or the ring-dove’s neck from changing ? 

No. Nor fettered love from dying 
In the knot there’s no untying.” 

Lawrence sat so motionless that he almost had an 
air of rigidity. He continued his straight-ahead stare 
as he remarked, in an indifferent voice, “ Meramble 
looks like a man who would not only sing like that, 
but act like that.” 

Prudence did not speak for some moments. Then 
she said she wondered why men seemed to hate each 
other so ; she never could understand it. 

“ Then what you have not understood may be 
beyond your comprehension altogether.” 

Here Lawrence drew out another cigar, con- 
templated it, and then returned it to its case. 

“ How pleasant the water-battery is ! ” exclaimed 
Prudence. 

“ Perfectly delightful,” was the man’s response. 

Another silence. Then Prudence turned with an 
indescribable, confiding movement towards her hus- 


“DON'T BE CRUEL TO ME." 191 

band. She slowly removed her glove, looking down 
at it as she did so. She gently and caressingly laid 
her bared hand in her husband’s, which was lying 
listlessly on his knee. The masculine fingers closed 
quickly about the feminine ones. 

But Lawrence did not yet turn his head. He 
knew that Prudence had moved imperceptibly nearer. 
Presently he heard a soft whisper, “ Dearest.” 

He turned now, and his eyes met a warm glance 
that was even more thrilling than the word had 
been. 

A fire sprang instantly to his eyes as he 
murmured : 

“ My darling ! My darling wife ! ” 

She responded to the eager pressure of his hand, 
the eager brilliance of his eyes. Then she said, with 
tender gaiety, “ It isn’t so stupid on the water-battery, 
after all, is it ? ” 

“ How can it be stupid where you are ? ” 

“ Oh, thank you ! That’s just what I intended you 
should say, Lawrence. It’s so nice not to have 
you disappoint me.” 

Here the two smiled into each other’s eyes ; and 
then Prudence added, “ You are never dull, you dear 
old fellow, only when you choose to be. That’s why 
it’s so very, very trying, you know.” 


192 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


“ But I don’t want to try you,” Lawrence 
responded. 

“ Perhaps it’s just because you’re a man, dear,” 
she said lightly, but still with the sweet warm look in 
her eyes. 

“ Then I fear I can’t help it if the trouble is so deep- 
seated as that.” There was an ardent strain below 
the lightness in his voice. “ Prue,” he added, in a 
half whisper, laughing slightly, “ if we were not on 
the water-battery I’m almost certain I should kiss 
you.” 

“ On the Plaza, for instance ? ” she asked, with a 
raising of the brows. “ I suppose we look quite 
ridiculous, as it is. Please throw my mantle over 
our hands ; that is, if you insist on keeping my hand 
in yours.” 

Lawrence flung the gray wrap over their clasped 
hands. He began to talk gaily. Suddenly he 
ceased speaking. Group after group had gone past 
them as they sat there, but now a man in white 
pantaloons, with a blue coat over a white rowing 
jersey, came walking over the battery. This man 
was middle-aged, swarthy, with a heavy black, care- 
fully kept beard, and black eyes with a puffiness 
beneath them. He came up hat in hand. 

“Of course I know I’m de trop , Mrs. Lawrence,” 


“DON'T BE CRUEL TO ME." 1 93 

he said, easily ; “ but then a man may decide to be 
even that for the sake of a word with you.” 

He nodded at Lawrence, who bowed with extreme 
distance in return, and who altogether had a look, as 
his wife informed him later, of wishing to rise and 
throw this newcomer into the sea. 

“ Only you’d have had a terrible armful, dear,” 
she concluded, with a laugh and a glint of the 
eyes. 

Having spoken thus, Mr. Meramble calmly sat 
down on the other side of Mrs. Lawrence and asked 
her if she didn’t think he had rowed by in excellent 
form. Whereupon they entered into a brisk talk 
about rowing and yacht-racing and kindred topics. 

Lawrence grew more and more glum, and at last 
rose and said he believed he would go back to the 
Ponce. 

To his surprise, Prudence also rose. 

“Wait a moment, dear,” she said, sweetly, “and 
I’ll go with you.” 

And of course Meramble rose, and refrained from 
accompanying them. 

“ I wish you were not quite such a donkey, Rod- 
ney,” said Prudence, as the two walked away. 

“Thanks for your good wish.” Lawrence had 
a sense of suffocation upon him. This sense was 


194 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

caused by his now having fully decided in his own 
mind that his wife used just such tones and just 
such glances with other men as she had used — nay, 
as she still used — with him. This conviction, he 
felt, was reached rather soon after his marriage, and 
he was in the first acute suffering of the full discov- 
ery which had been slowly, like a dull pain, coming 
to his consciousness. 

“ I don’t mean that you are habitually a donkey,” 
she went on, as they strolled through the Plaza, 
“but only occasionally, and, of course, just when you 
particularly ought not to be.” 

Here the speaker bowed to an acquaintance, and 
Lawrence hurriedly raised his hat without seeing 
whom they had met. 

“Just now,” she continued, “you ought to have 
been especially sweet to Mr. Meramble.” 

“ Why ? Because the creature is a blackguard 
and a male flirt ? ” 

Prudence raised her brows again. But she 
touched her husband’s sleeve, and her glance tried 
to meet his. 

“Because,” she answered, “he is one of those 
animals who like to make husbands jealous.” 

Lawrence turned towards his wife with a re- 
strained ferocity. 


“DON'T BE CRUEL TO ME." 1 95 

“ And you would let him ? ” he asked, speaking in 
a whisper lest he should speak too loud. 

Prudence threw back her head and laughed ; the 
merry sound made people near turn and look at her. 

“ Good heavens ! ” muttered Lawrence under his 
breath, “ what a thing it is to be a woman ! ” 

“ Not half so much of a thing as it is to be a man. 
A man is a miracle of suspicion and trust, of belief 
and incredulity. Don’t you believe me, you angry 
old Rodney ? ” she asked, with another touch on his 
arm, and a swift, sweet modulation of voice. 

“Yes,” he answered, grimly; “I believe every- 
thing you tell me.” 

“ Oh, no, you mustn’t do that, for soon you’ll be 
blaming me for deceiving you. But we’re getting 
off the subject, — Mr. Meramble. He likes to make 
you jealous. It is kind of exciting, you know, to 
suspect that some one is behind a door, or some- 
where, fuming and biting his nails down to the 
quick ; you’ve noticed that jealous people always 
bite their nails to the quick, haven’t you ? ” 

“ I can’t say I have.” / 

“ Well, they do ; I suppose they enjoy it. Now 
about Mr. Meramble ; have you anything special 
against him, Rodney dear ? ” 

“ Yes.” 


196 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

“ What ? ” 

“Do you want it in plain words ? ” 

“Oh, dear, yes. I’m not afraid of plain words; 
and really I’m getting interested in him.” 

“ Are you ? The plain words are that he is a 
gambler and a seducer of women.” 

“ Oh ! And perhaps he smokes, too ? ” 

The words left the smiling lips with a flippancy 
that seemed to Rodney nothing less than atrocious. 

And yet he could not help hoping that she was 
saying them only to shock him. He had often 
thought of late that she liked to shock him ; he 
could not understand such amusement, however. 

“We won’t talk any more here in public on this 
subject,” Lawrence said, when he believed he could 
speak in his ordinary tone ; “ if we wish to exhaust 
the topic, let us go back to the hotel.” 

“Very well ; and perhaps you’ll have me whipped 
if I don’t agree with you. I heard of a man the 
other day who said it was only cowardice on his part 
that he didn’t whip his wife.” 

To this remark Lawrence made no reply. The 
two were walking now towards the Ponce. Uncon- 
sciously Lawrence hastened his steps. 

When the door had closed upon them in their own 
apartments, Prudence suddenly turned to her hus- 


“DON'T BE CRUEL TO r/e." 1 97 

band, flung her arms about his neck, and pressed 
her head against his breast. She sobbed ; she clung 
to him as if she could never let him go ; and when 
he sat down with her held close in his arms, she 
lifted her tear-wet face, put a hand under his chin, 
and held his face away while she looked long and 
tenderly into his eyes. 

How could he have been so angry ? How could 
he ever forget for a moment the look he saw on her 
face now ? 

These were the questions he was asking himself, 
while his heart beat with the old rapture, the old 
intensity of joy in her presence. 

“ You ought not to be cruel to me,” she murmured, 
after awhile. Then, with a long, quivering breath, 
her head sank on his shoulder, and the two sat silent. 

At last Lawrence became aware that his wife had 
fallen asleep. He looked down at her with inex- 
pressible tenderness. He lightly kissed her forehead. 
He was already telling himself that he had been 
harsh, brutal. Was she never to speak to any one 
save him ? 

But, though he thought thus, though the burden 
in his arms was so unutterably dear to him, he had 
a conviction that he should not be able to refrain 
from returning to the subject of Meramble. Things 


198 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

were not yet satisfactorily settled. Lawrence could 
not understand how any self-respecting man could be 
willing that any of his womankind should be more 
than barely civil to a person like Meramble. Even 
women here in St. Augustine, who skimmed very 
near the fence that separated the respectable from 
those that were not respectable, stopped at Meram- 
ble. Some of them looked over the fence longingly, 
for Meramble was said to be mysteriously entertain- 
ing, and charmingly devoted when he chose to be so. 
And there was about his appearance something that 
seemed a cross between a man of the world and a 
bandit. And he could sing ; why, those who had 
heard him averred that even Mario could never have 
so “charmed with a tenor note the. souls in purga- 
tory” as could this man. 

Still, Meramble was “in society” and yet was 
only tolerated. The stories about him perhaps 
made him more interesting, while they made people 
afraid. The men nodded distantly at him ; what 
friends he found were women who would not be 
thought intimate with him, but who would not cut 
him dead, on “account of his brigand face,” their 
husbands said. 

It may be permitted to remark here that the time 
when a man thinks he has been “harsh and brutal” 


“ DON'T BE CRUEL TO ME." 1 99 

is the time when his wife can most easily “ twist him 
about her finger.” 

When Prudence woke, ten minutes later, she 
found Lawrence sitting motionless lest he should 
disturb her. She opened her eyes and gazed sleepily 
at him for an instant. Then she smiled and nestled 
still nearer to him. 

“ You dear old thing,” she said, in a whisper, “you 
must be aching in every bone. You may move 
now.” 

Lawrence changed his position slightly, but still 
held her. 

“There’s one thing I want to ask,” he said, 
presently. 

Prudence raised her head. “ Oh, dear ! ” she 
exclaimed, with a smile, “when a person wants to 
ask one thing it’s sure to be something dread- 
ful.” 

She began to stroke her husband’s face. Law- 
rence took her hand and held it fast. 

“ Nevertheless, I must ask it,” he said. 

“Well,” she said, resignedly, “go on.” 

She lay looking at him with soft shining eyes, 
her lips curved in something far sweeter than a 
smile. 

“ Are you going to be cruel to me ? ” she asked. 


200 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


“ Was I ever cruel ? ” 

“No, no, dear old boy. Now go on.” 

At this moment it seemed really ridiculous to 
Lawrence to ask what he had in mind to ask. But 
he kept to his resolve. 

“ I want you to promise not to — well, promise to 
snub that Meramble. Don’t be any more than barely 
civil to him. You know what I mean. It’s pollution 
for a woman to be kind to such a man.” 

Prudence raised her head and laughed. 

“ Is that all ? ” she said. “ Ask me something 
harder than that. What do I care for Mr. Meram- 
ble ? Pshaw ! I can give you that promise easily 
enough.” 

“ Oh, you will, then ? ” he asked, eagerly. 

“ Certainly.” 

And upon this Lawrence was afraid he had been a 
silly tyrant. But he now inquired why, then, Pru- 
dence smiled on that confounded scamp. 

“ Smiled on him ? ” she inquired, in bewilderment. 

“Yes; in a — well, in a peculiar way, calculated 
to make him think you cared for him — or would 
like him to care for you — or — oh, no matter what. 
Stop smiling on him, anyway.” 

Here Lawrence tried to laugh. He felt awkward 
and foolish. 


DON'T BE CRUEL TO ME. 


201 


Prudence rose. She knelt down in front of her 
husband and crossed her arms over her bosom. 

“My lord,” she said, in a low voice, “your will is 
my law. So be it, even as you have said. I will 
smile no more on that Meramble man person. And 
if your slave does not obey, cut off her head ; then 
she will smile no more on any one.” 

Lawrence leaned forward and caught his wife 
back in his arms. 

His spirits suddenly rose wildly, and they kept at 
this high tide for several days. Prudence was as 
she had been immediately before and after their 
marriage, passionately in love with him, gay, saucy, 
tender, caressing. 

Therefore he was somewhat surprised that, when 
he came home from Jacksonville one morning, he 
should meet an acquaintance who should say : 

“You’ve missed the excursion down to Matanzas, 
Lawrence.” 

“Yes, but I meant to miss it,” was the re- 
ponse. 

Afterward Lawrence remembered that the man 
looked at him with some curiosity as he remarked, 
carelessly : 

“ Mrs. Lawrence likes such junketings better than 
we do. She’s gone in Meramble’s launch.” 


202 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


“Yes,” Lawrence heard himself saying, carelessly, 
“ she’s always happy in a boat. How did the tennis 
match come out ? Eustace won, of course ? ” 

Then Lawrence walked slowly from the station by 
this man’s side, and put questions about the tennis 
match, and seemed interested in the lengthy replies. 
But when he was at last left alone he strode eagerly 
down to the wharves. He knew there was no regu- 
lar conveyance to Matanzas, but as he felt now he 
would go if he had to walk or swim there. He would 
not try to analyze or subdue the fury in his heart. 
It was not that he was jealous in the ordinary sense 
of the word. But that broken promise gave him a 
poignant and terrible sense of desecration. 

As he asked here and there at the wharves for 
a sailboat, he could hardly bring himself to listen to 
the replies because of the agony of humiliation that 
overwhelmed him. He recalled with piercing vivid- 
ness every look and tone as his wife had given the 
promise. What had she meant ? And did she 
love him ? Impossible to doubt it ; and yet — 
The sting of that “ yet ” was unbearable. 

He found a small sailboat which he could hire. 
The wind was just right, and he started. It seemed 
to him that he did not look to the right or left as his 
boat glided down between the Florida bank and the 


“DON'T BE CRUEL TO ME. 


203 


shore of Anastasia Island. The soft air was sweet 
with the smells of pine woods and salt water. The 
white gulls flew over him ; the marsh ponies galloped 
up to the brink of the river to look at him, then as 
he came nearer they snorted and galloped away again, 
mane and tail flying. 

It was several hours before his craft sailed up to 
the rickety old wharf near the ruin of the Spanish 
fort. 

Two or three people were strolling on the beach, 
poking the fiddler-crabs with canes, or looking idly 
off about them. 

“ Hullo, Lawrence ; so you decided you’d come, 
after all, eh ? ” 

“Yes; thought better of it when I found I got 
back from Jacksonville in time.” 

Lawrence would not ask concerning his wife. A 
burning pain seemed to have seized his heart. He 
had not eaten since morning, and then but a few 
morsels of food. He was obliged to battle against 
a certain tremor of the limbs that sometimes came 
upon him. He walked along among the fiddler-crabs 
that were everywhere darting into their holes and 
then coming out again. He examined these crabs 
as if they were of the greatest interest to him. 
He talked a great deal with the people he met. 


204 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY \ 


Two or three of them spoke afterwards of his 
appearance, and some averred that there was a 
peculiar expression in his eyes. But there are 
people who make use of such phrases after a thing 
has happened. 


CHAPTER XIII. 


AN INVOLUNTARY BATH. 

Strolling thus in front of the old house with its 
big chimneys and verandas, Lawrence thought he 
would go and sit down on one of those verandas : 
people who saw him would suppose he was enjoying 
the scenery, and he was conscious of an imperative 
desire to think calmly. That was what he had been 
trying to do all the way down here, — think calmly. 
He called himself an idiot, an unmitigated idiot, for 
coming at all. How should he better things by 
coming ? 

He rose from the old bench on which he had been 
sitting, and walked around the corner of the house. 
Walking, thus, he came upon a man and a woman 
standing there within the shade of some thick 
clambering vines. 

The man’s back was towards Lawrence, but the 
woman’s face was plain to his sight, with upraised 
eyes and — he could not be sure of the expression, 
for Prudence instantly advanced, saying, briskly : 

205 


206 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


“ So nice of you, Rodney, to come, after all. Mr. 
Meramble was just suggesting that we go back to 
the launch and take a turn outside and see where 
Menendez and his ruffians came in.” 

“ Capital idea,” responded Lawrence, a trifle too 
pleasantly. “ I always thought Menendez was rather 
overestimated as a scamp. You remember we looked 
the whole thing up when we came to Augustine, 
Prudence? ” 

He glanced at his wife with a most amiable 
expression. Meramble hastened to ask Lawrence 
to go in the launch, and Lawrence accepted with 
rather profuse thanks. He talked glibly as the 
three made their way to the bit of a craft, which 
required no work save what its owner could do 
himself. 

Two or three times Prudence gave her husband 
a swift look in which perhaps there was a hint of 
questioning terror. She had never seen him in the 
least like this. She recalled, for the first time since 
she had heard it, the remark her Aunt Letitia had 
once made to the effect that Rodney had a terrible 
temper when he was roused, but that he usually kept 
it under control. 

You would have said that these three people were 
on the best of terms with one another as they went 


AN INVOLUNTARY BATH. 20y 

talking and laughing down to the launch, and as they 
embarked and the little craft began to glide out into 
the open sea. Prudence afterward told some one that, 
as her husband looked full at her with such extremely 
pleasant eyes, she didn’t known why she should think 
of Bluebeard and a few other characters noted for 
amiability to their wives. 

At any rate, there was something in the suavity of 
Lawrence’s manner that soon made it a great effort 
for Prudence to speak at all, try as she would. Her 
smile became constrained ; her heart beat heavily. 
She sat under the little awning and looked at the 
two men. 

Lawrence was telling a story with good effect ; 
sometimes he smiled as he talked ; he was really 
very entertaining and very good-humored. His 
wife endeavored to forget the time when she had 
given him a certain promise. Were such prom- 
ises ever kept, any more than the false vows that 
men were continually making ? 

The launch was going quite fast, straight out on 
the smooth water to sea. The land was already two 
or three miles away. 

Prudence saw Lawrence turn and look towards the 
coast that lay low, its white sand glittering in the 
bright light. Then he glanced towards Meramble. 


208 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


“ Can you swim, Mr. Meramble ? ” he asked, 
presently. 

“ Certainly,” the man replied, with a slight accent 
of surprise. 

“ So fortunate,” returned Lawrence. 

“ Why fortunate ? ” 

“ Because I am presently going to throw you into 
the sea,” was the suave answer. 

The other man thought this was a joke, and a very 
poor joke. But he laughed, and said there might be 
a difference of opinion about that. 

“ Oh, no, I think not ; I think I can do it easily.” 

“ Ah ! ” 

Meramble’s white teeth glittered in his black 
beard. Yes, it was a joke in the very worst pos- 
sible taste, and before Mrs. Lawrence, too. But 
he smiled all the same as he uttered the interjec- 
tion. 

The sense of electricity in the clear air suddenly 
became almost intolerable. 

“ Damn him ! ” Meramble was saying to himself, 
“ what’s he talking like that for ? ” 

Lawrence sat silent for a few moments, gazing 
towards the shore. Prudence made an effort to 
keep up some kind of conversation. Though Rod- 
ney terrified her, she was secretly admiring him. 


AN INVOLUNTARY BATH. 209 

She was thinking that she had not known he could 
be exactly like this. 

Lawrence turned from his contemplation of the 
receding shore to objects nearer. 

He rose with the utmost quietness of move- 
ment. He stooped slightly, and, notwithstanding 
the quick and furious warding motion made by 
Meramble, that gentleman was lifted bodily up, and 
flung over the boat’s side, where he fell splashing 
into the water. 

The boat darted away from him, but not so soon 
that the two in it could not hear the terrible oath 
he uttered. 

“ Oh, Rodney ! ” cried Prudence, starting from 
her seat. 

“ Sit down,” said Rodney, calmly, but his face 
was not quite steady. Now that his anger had 
done something to satisfy itself, he must begin to 
feel the reaction in some way. 

“He will drown,” said Prudence. 

“No matter.” 

“ But you will be hanged.” 

“In that case you will be a widow.” 

Here Lawrence began to laugh. Drops of mois- 
ture appeared on his forehead. 

Prudence rose again. This time she came and 


210 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


was going to sit down by her husband, but he made 
a gesture for her to go back. 

“ He won’t drown, — never fear,” he said. 

“ As if I cared whether he drowned or not ! ” she 
cried. “It’s you I care for.” 

At this Lawrence laughed again. He was watch- 
ing Meramble, who was swimming after them, his 
black head shining on top of the water. 

Now he withdrew his eyes from Meramble, and 
fixed them on his wife. He felt as if a devil were 
in him that was not yet satisfied. And why should 
he still have that furious, unreasoning love for this 
woman? Had she not jilted him once, and when 
she could not get her English lord, had she not won 
him again ? Did she love him ? Had she ever 
loved him ? Good God ! it was dreadful to look 
at her now and doubt her. There was terror in 
her face, but there was something else, too, the thing 
which had lured him and held him, and which he was 
afraid would always hold him ; and it seemed to be 
love for him, — some cruel passion which a woman 
like her was capable of feeling, even while she 
coquetted with other men. He did not understand ; 
he was not going to endure it. 

Lawrence was sitting in the place just occupied by 
Meramble. He wished to be ready to attend to the 


AN INVOLUNTARY BATH. 


2 1 1 


launch ; he had put it about directly, and they were 
now returning to the shore. Prudence had taken 
her seat near him. With some appearance of timid- 
ity she leaned forward and touched his sleeve. 

“ I would never testify against you,” she said, in 
an awed whisper, her terror plainly visible. 

“ Testify?” he repeated, scornfully; “never fear 
about that. That creature won’t drown ; and he’ll 
never tell how he came to have this bath. I didn’t 
seem to have any opportunity to thrash him, so I 
threw him over. If you think he’s going to drown, 
I’ll stop and pick him up. I’m afraid he won’t love 
me any the better for this. I had to do it, how- 
ever, or kill him outright.” 

Lawrence spoke so rapidly that his words were 
hardly distinguishable. He no longer attempted to 
seem amiable. There was a ferocious light in his 
eyes, and he was very pale. Altogether he looked 
as a man may look who for the time has given 
himself over to the devil. Being an honorable man 
with an unseared conscience, he would have to pay 
a good price in self-contempt for the last half-hour. 
But the time for the self-contempt had not yet 
struck. 

Prudence sat quietly trembling, — nay, she was 
almost cowering, — watching her companion with 


212 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


great eyes that made her face wild and strange. 
Why is it that an outbreak of savage Berserker blood 
so often excites admiration in the spectator ? Does 
a drop of that same barbarian blood mingle yet with 
the milder current of civilization ? 

It was not the way of Prudence to keep silent, 
no matter what was happening. But she was afraid 
to speak now, and afraid to remain silent. She hesi- 
tated ; she wanted to grasp her husband’s arm, but 
the slight touch she had given him was all she dared. 
Was this the man whom she had been able to influ- 
ence? Odd that she should be so proud of him 
because he had picked up Meramble and tossed 
him over the boat’s side. Odd that she should be 
sure that she should never have any interest in 
Meramble again. How contemptible he had looked, 
flying over the side ! But he had had a great way 
with his eyes, and he was said to be dangerous. 

Here she laughed hysterically. 

Meramble, swimming along behind, happened to 
hear that laugh, and he gnashed his teeth as if he 
were the villain of a melodrama. And he swore 
also, and swam still faster through the smooth 
water. If he had had a pistol in his hand at that 
moment, it is quite probable that he would have 
fired at those two in the launch, and I am quite 


AN INVOLUNTARY BATH. 


213 


certain he would have aimed at the woman first. 
Fortunately, however, in these days of high enlight- 
enment we do not usually have revolvers within 
reach every time we are indignant. 

“ Do let him get in, Rodney,” Prudence at length 
exclaimed, as soon as she could stop laughing. 

At this Lawrence literally glared at her. Then 
he asked if she were so anxious concerning her 
friend’s safety. 

“ No,” she answered, hardily ; “ I don’t care a 
penny whether he drowns or not. But you — oh, 
I’m afraid for you ! He won’t love you after this.” 

Then, in spite of herself, she began to laugh 
again, and then she burst into a violent fit of weep- 
ing, bending forward and hiding her face in her 
hands as she did so. 

“ No,” said Lawrence, grimly ; “ I don’t think 
I’ve done anything to win his affection.” 

As he spoke, he slowed the launch. Its owner 
presently came up alongside and laid hold of the 
boat’s edge. 

“ Do you want to get aboard ? ” inquired Law- 
rence. 

It was an instant before Meramble could reply. 
Poor devil, it was hard on him ! 

“ Is there any other craft near ? ” he asked, finally. 


214 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


Lawrence gazed leisurely about him. “ None 
within five miles, I should say,” was the answer. 

To this Meramble made no reply in words. The 
launch came to a stand, and he scrambled aboard. 
It is dreadful when a human being has within him 
quite so much of a wild-beast rage. Meramble knew 
that he had been made ridiculous before this woman. 
He knew that he was dripping and ridiculous now. 
He had not been in any real danger ; real danger 
would have eliminated the ridiculous. 

Lawrence rose, bowed, and relinquished the charge 
of the launch to its owner. 

Meramble sat down without a word. Since he 
could not use the violent oaths which were all the 
words he wanted to use, he did not know why he 
should speak at all. 

So it was in entire silence that the three went 
back to land. The group on the shore came down 
to the wharf, uttering exclamations and inquiries. 

Meramble explained that he had been awkward 
enough to fall into the water, but that Lawrence 
(with a look at that gentleman) had been kind 
enough to rescue him, and he added that he, 
Meramble, should never rest until he had been 
able to do as much for Mr. Lawrence. 

Somebody on the wharf affirmed that, at this 


AN INVOLUNTARY BATH. 


215 


speech, Mrs. Lawrence shuddered unmistakably. 
Therefore, a wise few immediately asserted that 
there was more in Meramble’s falling into the water 
than met the eye. 

When Lawrence tried to recall how he and his 
wife reached St. Augustine and the Ponce that 
night, he could never remember the slightest thing. 
Apparently they did get back the same as the rest 
of the party. 

The next day the owner of the sailboat came to 
Lawrence and demanded to know what had become 
of it. Then Lawrence endeavored to carry his mind 
back to the sailboat, and to explain. But it ended 
in his paying the man an exorbitant price for the 
boat, and so settling the matter that way. 


CHAPTER XIV. 


A BULL TERRIER. 

After this Prudence said she would not stay in 
St. Augustine another day ; she affirmed that the 
place was hateful to her. She said she expected 
to find Rodney with a dagger stuck through him, 
if he left her for a moment. 

Lawrence listened calmly to all this. The two 
were on the water-battery of the old fort again, and 
he was smoking. It was the week following the 
expedition to Matanzas. 

Prudence looked pale and very charming in a 
white suit that fitted as her clothes always fitted. 
Lawrence once told her, with a suspicion of bitter- 
ness in his tone, that if she were to be led out to 
execution she would not pray, she would only ask if 
her gown were becoming, and was her hair right ? 

“ Where do you want to go ? ” he inquired. 

“ I don’t care.” 

“ That means you do care.” 

216 


A BULL TERRIER. 


21 7 


He reached forward, and knocked the ash from 
his cigar against a stone. To-day his face was 
almost colorless, and his eyes were hard ; and the 
dreadful thing about his eyes was that when they 
were turned upon his wife they did not change. 

As for Prudence, she would have said that her 
heart was like lead. She dared not soften her 
voice when she addressed her husband, lest he 
might turn savagely upon her, though his manner 
now was as gentle and cold as a flake of snow. 
She glanced at him shyly, and was inwardly irri- 
tated that she should feel timid. She did not wish 
to be afraid of anything. One is not comfortable 
when one is afraid. And she was admiring him 
also ; and she wished to tell him of that admira- 
tion, and hang upon him, and smile, and caress him. 

“ No,” she said, at last, in response to his words ; 
“it means exactly what I say.” 

“ Since when have you meant what you say ? ” 

He turned his cool, veiled eyes upon her, scanning 
her interrogatively. 

She plucked up courage, and replied, lightly : 

“ Oh, I’ve always had seasons of meaning what I 
say.” 

“ Indeed ! But how is one to know when it is the 
season for truth ? ” 


2 1 8 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


He spoke carelessly, as if he had no interest in the 
reply, whatever it should be. He puffed out a cloud 
of smoke and watched it float away. 

Prudence drew her light mantle closely about her. 
She would not press her hands together beneath it, 
though she was tempted to do so. 

She had expected an explanation, storm, tears, 
renewed tenderness. Surely he could not be tired 
of her so soon. 

She did not answer his question, but apparently 
he did not notice this. 

“ Rodney, let us go away,” she said, earnestly. “ I 
hoped Mr. Meramble would go, but, since he stays, 
I can’t endure my anxiety about you. I can’t — I 
can’t ! ” 

Her voice grew unsteady. She looked at her 
husband entreatingly ; tears gathered in her eyes. 

“ I am sorry to have you suffer from anxiety on 
my account,” he responded, courteously; “but I 
think we will remain here. Augustine is a small 
place, I know, but it will hold Mr. Meramble and 
me.” 

“ Please go ! ” 

She moved a little nearer. A faint flush came 
to his face. 

“ Sorry to refuse you, Prudence, but you ought to 


A BULL TERRIER. 


219 


see that after having flung Meramble into the water 
I can’t run away as if I were afraid of him. Still, we 
don’t fight duels nowadays, you know.” 

“But sometimes folks kill some other folks,” she 
returned. 

Lawrence shrugged his shoulders and said nothing. 

“ And Mr. Meramble’s smile is so very glittering ; 
it makes my backbone cold,” Prudence went on ; 
“and when he looks at you I feel like screaming.” 

“I wouldn’t scream, if I were you,” Lawrence 
remarked. 

“ I sha’n’t, if I can help it ; but I’m sure the time 
will come when I can’t help it.” 

“In that case I’ll call you insane and put you into 
an asylum.” 

Lawrence spoke these words so calmly that his 
wifq shivered again, though she knew he was jesting. 
The glance she gave him now was not pleasant. 

She turned towards the river and gazed at it, while 
her companion smoked. Already it seemed months 
since the other day when he and she had sat there 
and she had made him look at her with love. 

“ I’m nearly certain that it has leaked out that Mr. 
Meramble didn’t fall into the water,” said Prudence, 
after a silence. “I suppose somebody must have 
been looking through a glass at us, People are 


220 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


always looking through a glass at the ocean and 
telling each other what they see. That man will 
do something, I tell you. He isn’t smiling in such 
a shining way for nothing.” 

“Very well; let us wait and see what he does. 
We shall have thus some interest in life left to us ; 
that will be something for which to be grateful to 
your friend.” 

“ My friend ! ” 

“ Certainly ; and he may thank you for his 
ducking.” 

Lawrence again puffed out a cloud of smoke and 
watched it dissipate in the blue air. But his wife 
refrained from speaking. 

A few more days passed. On one of them Pru- 
dence remarked that they had made a great mistake 
in leaving Europe ; in Europe they wouldn’t have 
met Mr. Meramble. 

“ It might as well be Meramble as another ; it was 
sure to be somebody,” Lawrence returned. 

That afternoon a great many of the winter resi- 
dents attended a tennis match. Of course Mr. and 
Mrs. Lawrence were there ; so was Meramble ; and 
just as the game was over this latter gentleman sud- 
denly appeared near Lawrence, who was in the midst 
of a group of men and women. 


A BULL TERRIER . 


221 


Meramble’s face was crimson, and he was smiling. 
People looked at him curiously as he made his way 
among them. He carried a dog-whip in his hand ; 
but then there was a bull-terrier at his heels, follow- 
ing closely, his red eyes watching his master. 

“ How do you do, Mr. Lawrence ? ” Meramble 
asked. 

His voice was a trifle loud ; but Lawrence spoke 
very low as he answered, distinctly, “ How do you 
do, Mr. Meramble ? ” 

“ Never was better in my life, thanks. I owe you 
one. Sometimes I have a fancy to pay my debts — 
as now.” 

There was quite a theatrical air about the man as 
he spoke ; indeed, his appearance usually savored of 
the melodrama. 

“ Ah ! That so ? ” said Lawrence, calmly. He 
was thinking, “ That fellow knows that people 
know I flung him in.” 

He had barely time to finish this thought when 
Meramble started forward and swung his dog-whip 
square across Lawrence’s face. Lawrence felt a 
stinging blindness that confused him and made 
him reel for the instant. And he could not gather 
himself before something else had come upon him. 
Meramble’s dog was at his throat ; the brute had 


222 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


fastened himself there and was swinging by his 
hold. 

There was a rush, a shouting, a scramble of several 
men forward to get the dog off. 

Meramble stood back and looked on ; he was still 
smiling with a glitter of black eyes and white teeth. 

Somebody got hold of the dog’s legs. But some- 
body else was nearer still, and in the utter confusion 
in Lawrence’s senses he yet heard a voice say, sharply, 
“ No ! no ! His throat ! His throat ! ” 

And all the time he himself was trying to find the 
dog’s throat ; but he was like a man whose hands 
would not obey him. The stroke so near his eyes 
had cut like a knife, and his brain was still reeling 
from it, and from the onset of the dog. 

But he thought he recognized the voice crying out 
thus ; and, curiously, in the hurrying blackness of the 
moment he was aware that he inhaled the odor of 
iris. 

It was really but a second before he knew that his 
wife’s fingers, strong and unflinching, were choking 
the beast from him. He heard him panting, then he 
heard the gurgle in the dog’s throat ; the teeth had 
to let go. 

The terrier dropped to the ground, and was caught 
up by some masculine grasp and flung somewhere. 


A BULL TERRIER. 


223 


Lawrence blindly opened his arms and gathered 
his wife unto them. She lay trembling on his 
breast. 

Some irrepressible in the crowd uttered a cheer for 
Mrs. Lawrence ; the cheer was taken up, and every 
man there, save two, roared lustily in another “ cheer 
for Mrs. Lawrence.” 

In the midst of it all, Lawrence, holding Prudence, 
heard her whisper, with her lips on his face : 

“ My dearest ! ” 

In that instant his heart gave a glorious bound of 
ecstatic happiness. 

Immediately she withdrew from his arms ; some- 
body went off for a physician, for Lawrence’s throat 
was torn and bleeding ; somebody else offered an 
arm to him to assist him back to the hotel. There 
was a babel of talk and exclamation, and in the midst 
of it Meramble, still almost purple in the face, and 
still smiling, walked away. 

When he was well clear of the crowd this gentle- 
man paused and looked about him. Then he whistled 
a long-drawn-out note. A moment after this note 
had died on the air a black and white bull-terrier with 
red eyes, and with some drops of blood on his muzzle 
and chest, came at a slow sling trot from some place 
unseen and ranged at his master’s heels. Then dog 


224 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


and man walked out of sight, and I think out of the 
pages of this chronicle. 

Lawrence’s lacerated throat kept him in his room 
for some days. He lay on a lounge and tried to 
listen to Prudence as she read or talked to him. She 
was very sweet and very lovely. Lawrence felt the 
old charm of her presence, her smile, and her voice ; 
he thrilled as he recalled over and over again her 
voice, and her words, and her act when the dog was 
at his throat. 

But all the time, notwithstanding everything, there 
was with him the dull memory of her wantonly broken 
promise about her behavior to Meramble. He could 
remember too vividly her face as she had been talk- 
ing with Meramble on the veranda of the old house 
at Matanzas. 

When this remembrance was at its keenest, it was 
only by great self-restraint that Lawrence refrained 
from starting up and shouting out a curse for the 
woman who could do such a thing. But she loved 
him ? The old, dreadful question ; she loved him ? 
Even now, in the midst of smiles and tears and 
kisses, she could make him believe her. 

For the first three days Prudence was devotedly 
attentive ; she scarcely left his side, and her devotion 
was plainly spontaneous. 


A BULL TERRIER. 


225 


A slight fever had set in, though the wounded 
throat was doing as well as such a hurt could do. 
Prudence began to grow listless in the very slightest 
degree. 

Lawrence made her leave him and go down into 
the court, where a party were heard laughing and 
talking. After she had gone, with painful intentness 
he listened for her voice. 

AH ! there it was. He raised himself on his 
elbow. Yes, honey sweet, gay, seductive, suggest- 
ive. He listened, his wounded throat throbbing as 
he did so. It was not that he desired to know what 
she said, it was only her tones that he must hear. 
And he groaned as he heard them. 

He wished he might be able to understand her. 
He was not the first man who has wished to be able 
to understand a woman. 

As Lawrence sank again on his couch, another 
day came back to his mind, — that day when he had 
been lying in his room at Savin Hill and had heard 
Prudence laugh outside. 

Then he had been going to marry Carolyn Ffolliott. 
Then — he groaned again and moved uneasily. 

It was terrible for a man like Lawrence to have 
one spot in his life which he dared not touch. He 
winced every time he came near that place in his 


226 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


mind. He wished that it might be covered up, en- 
cysted like some morbid growth in the body, and not 
remain so atrociously alive. As a man runs away 
from some place where he knows he will be hurt, so 
Lawrence’s mind always ran away from the thought 
of Carolyn. Yet somehow, within the last few 
weeks, he could not help thinking of her. 

He had stopped his ears against any news from 
Savin Hill. He even shrank from looking too closely 
at a Boston newspaper, lest he should see the name 
of Ffolliott. 

Not a week ago Prudence had silently put before 
him a paper with her finger on a paragraph. This 
was the paragraph : 

“ At a reception lately given by Mrs. Letitia Ffolliott at her 
residence on Commonwealth Avenue, among the prominent 
guests was Lord Maxwell. His lordship came to the States 
some months ago, bringing an invalid wife. His friends will 
learn with regret that Lady Maxwell has since died. We 
understand that Lord Maxwell will remain in Boston for 
some weeks.” 

Lawrence’s lip curled as he read these lines, and 
Mrs. Lawrence laughed. 

“ His lordship ! ” she exclaimed, and laughed again. 

“ How the fair women will smile upon him ! ” 
cynically remarked Lawrence ; and he added, “ Well, 


A BULL TERRIER. 22J 

he hasn’t a teaspoonful of brains, but he has his 
title.” 

“ Yes,” said Prudence, “and now he has the brew- 
er’s money without the brewer’s daughter. Perhaps 
he will marry Carolyn Ffolliott.” 

Having sent this shaft, Prudence refrained from 
looking to see if it went home. 

Lawrence said quietly that he did not believe 
Carolyn would marry a man she did not love; but 
then, she might love Maxwell. 

And here the subject had dropped ; but neither of 
these two forgot it. 

Lawrence grew very restless during those days 
when he was confined to his room at the hotel. The 
lacerated wound induced some fever, but still he was 
doing as well as possible. After the first, Prudence 
did not stay with him. She could bravely attack a 
dog in his behalf, but it appeared that she could not 
stop in a sick-room. Lawrence urged her to go, and, 
after a due amount of reluctance, she went. Her 
husband had plenty of time to think ; he could not 
always thrust remembrance from him. He seemed 
to himself to be a very poor kind of a being. Where 
were his hopes for a career of usefulness and 
dignity in the world ? Were they all lost for a 
woman’s smile ? And his self-respect ? Had he 


228 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


bartered the peace of years for the rapture of 
moments ? 

And Prudence was getting tired of him. It was 
impossible any longer to doubt that fact ; as impossi- 
ble as it was to doubt that other fact that she had 
once had a passion for him which she was willing to 
indulge when she could not marry an English noble- 
man. She greatly preferred him, Lawrence. Here 
Lawrence uttered a very grim-sounding word. 

In spite of himself, Lawrence did a great amount 
of thinking in those days, when he did not mean to 
think at all, and when he could often hear, in court 
or veranda, his wife’s gay laugh mingling with the 
plash of fountains and the murmur of music. 

But she said she was greatly bored, that it was 
hard to wait until Rodney could get out again. 

The second time she said this, Lawrence responded 
by saying that as soon as he was able they would go 
North. 

“ What ! before spring ? ” she asked, in surprise, 
and with a hint of indignation. 

“ Yes, before spring. I’ve been idle long enough. 
You’ve forgotten that I’m a lawyer. I had just 
begun to have a little success. I’ll put on harness 
again.” 

Prudence glanced at him with an elevation of 


A BULL TERRIER. 


229 


eyebrow ; she was wise in her way, and she knew 
that now was one of the times when it would do 
no good for her to plead. 

Thinking over the matter afterwards, Prudence 
decided that it would, after all, be more interesting 
to go North. 


CHAPTER XV. 


“TOO MUCH FOR ANY WOMAN TO FORGIVE.” 

Though summer comes very slowly to New Eng- 
land, it yet does come, and when it has fully arrived 
its sumptuous beauty makes amends for all delays. 

It was summer again at Savin Hill. There was 
the ocean in its splendor just as it had been the year 
before. The year before ? Was it not rather a dozen 
years before ? This was the question Lawrence put 
to himself as he stood on one of the cliffs from 
which he could see the towers of the Ffolliott sum- 
mer residence. He and his wife had come down 
to Seaview to stay for awhile. He thought that, 
unless he chose, he would not be likely to see the 
Ffolliotts. He could hardly understand why he 
longed to be at the old familiar shore. He sup- 
posed it was because he was not quite well, — not 
ill, by any means, but not in his usual robust health. 
He hardly knew what was the trouble. He seemed 
to have recovered from the attack of the dog. The 
230 


“ TOO MUCH FOR ANY WOMAN TO FORGIVE . ” 23 I 

physician whom he consulted did not mention any 
disease, but he gave strong advice against work at 
present. “Just have a good time,” he had said, 
at which Lawrence had laughed. 

Now, as he stood on this cliff, his eyes dwelt upon 
that chateau-like house which had once been a home 
to him. Never a home to him again. Sometimes 
his dishonorable way of leaving that place so rankled 
in him that he wanted to cry aloud, or weep like a 
hysterical woman. That was because he was not 
well, of course, though not ill ; no, indeed, not ill. 
He would soon be at work again. When he could 
once work he would cease to be so weak. As for 
Prudence, she no longer hung upon him with pas- 
sionate caresses ; she was careless, though good- 
natured. He fancied he had seen a half-concealed 
contempt in her glance of late. Well, no one could 
despise him as much as he despised himself. He 
sometimes thought that he was one of those poor 
creatures who could do evil, but who were not 
strong enough to stop thinking about it after it 
was done. 

“ In short,” he said, aloud, “ I haven’t the courage 
of my wickedness.” 

At first Prudence had made him forget everything 
but herself ; she was a kind of hasheesh to him. 


232 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


But she was getting weary of him, — nay, was already 
weary. 

Lawrence had sat down on the cliff by this time. 
Somebody was coming up the other side. In a 
moment a boy’s head appeared. Lawrence leaned 
forward quickly. Leander Ffolliott sprang up and 
came forward, — a little taller for one year’s growth, 
but otherwise much the same. 

“ I bet ten to one ’twas you,” he said, “ when I saw 
you first.” 

He held out his hand, and the two greeted each 
other cordially. Lawrence was sorry for himself 
that he should be so glad to see this youth, but he 
perceived by Leander’ s manner that the boy knew 
nothing of any reason why they should not be on 
good terms. This knowledge touched the man. He 
leaned back and put his hands under his head as 
he gazed at his companion. How ridiculously glad 
he was to see him ! 

There stood the boy, feet wide apart, hands in his 
pockets, hat tipped to the back of his head. 

“You ain’t well, are you?” was Leander’s first 
question. 

“ Pretty well, thank you. How is it with you ? ” 

“Tip-top. I say, where’s Devil? Is he alive?” 

“Very much alive. We take him everywhere.” 


“ TOO MUCH FOR ANY WOMAN TO FORGIVE . ” 233 

“That so ? Wish you’d give him to me.” 

“ I will.” 

“ Golly ! Will you ? ” The boy jumped on one 
foot, and then on the other. “ I’ll go back with you 
after him. But mebb'y you’ll bring him ? ” 

“ No. You may take him.” 

Leander screwed up one eye and contemplated 
Lawrence on the rock before him. 

“ I will. Say, you married Prue, didn’t you ? ” 

“ Yes.” 

“ So I thought, near’s I could tell. Folks been 
awful mum ’bout the whole thing. I s’pose ’twas 
kind of odd, wa’n’t it ? ” 

“ Perhaps.” 

“Yes, I guess ’twas,” was the response, “’cause I 
asked Caro one day if ’twas odd. She said ’twasn’t 
odd, ’twas natural ; but I didn’t believe her, all the 
same. Been sick much ? ” 

“ I’m not sick.” 

“You don’t look right, somehow. Let’s go down 
to the house. Folks’ll be awful glad to see you. 
Come on.” 

“I don’t think I’ll go now.” 

“ Why not ? I say, ain’t it funny that the Britisher’s 
there again this summer ? ” 

“ Is he ? ” 


234 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY \ 


“Yes. Comes a lot. Sparkin’ sis, I s’pose. 
Sparkin’ Prue last summer, you know, — wife takin’ 
sulphur somewhere. Wife dead now. I say, is 
Prue’s much of a brick’s ever.” 

“ I think so.” 

“It must be awfully jolly, then, to have her around 
all the time, same’s you have folks when you’re 
married to ’em. I wanted Prue to wait for me, ’n’ 
marry me. She said she would ; but you see she 
didn’t.” 

“Yes, so I see ; but if I should happen not to live 
you might have a chance still.” 

Leander eyed the speaker for some seconds in 
silence before he said, “You wa’n’t drowned when 
the Vireo went to pieces ? ” 

“ Apparently not.” 

“Yes, it does seem sb. Did she go on a 
rock ? ” 

“ No ; run into.” 

“ And what became of you ’n’ Prue ? ” 

“ Picked up.” 

“ So you thought you’d get married ? ” 

“ Yes.” 

“ Well, the folks felt awful when they thought 
you were all dead ; ’n’ so did I. Afterward I over- 
heard marmer say she didn’t think it possible you 



“ LAWRENCE SPRANG TO HIS FEET 


11 














































- 














• 





























































“ TOO MUCH FOR ANY WOMAN TO FORGIVE .” 235 

could be such a scamp. I s’pose she meant as not 
to be drowned. Funny, though, wasn’t it ? ” 

“ Very.” 

“They were goin’ to put on black, but Caro 
wouldn’t ; she said you wa’n’t drowned. I say, how 
do you lug the crow round ? ” 

“We have a big cage and have it in the baggage- 
car.” 

Leander contemplated this fact in silence for a 
time. It was plain that some things puzzled him. 
Then he took out his watch, evidently something 
new, for he had already looked at it twice in this 
interview. 

“I guess it’s about time she was here,” he 
remarked. 

“ Who ? ” asked Lawrence, quickly. 

“ Why, Caro, of course. I was going to show her 
how my new fish-pole works. It’s down below 
there. Oh, there she is now.” 

Lawrence sprang to his feet. He was too late. 
Carolyn stepped up on to the rock where the two 
stood. 

She had not noticed any sound of voices ; she was 
there in front of this man, and could not retreat. 
But she gave no sign of wishing to retreat. After 
the first instantaneous and uncontrollable flutter of 


236 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

features, she was calm,' — how calm she was! So 
Lawrence thought. He supposed it was the calm- 
ness of contempt. He knew that she ought to feel 
contempt for him ; more than that, he ought to wish 
her to feel it. 

If he had only been manly in his manner of deser- 
tion ! If he had only told her that his old passion 
for Prudence had sprung into life again stronger 
than ever ; that would have been bad enough, but 
that now seemed honor itself compared with what he 
had really done. 

He gave one look into her steady, lovely eyes. 
Had she always been as beautiful as she was now ? 

He told himself, meanly and bitterly, that she 
couldn’t have suffered much from what he had done. 
After all, he might have been very much mistaken 
in his estimate of her love for him. Perhaps women 
could not love deeply, anyway. 

Lawrence did not know how pale he was ; but he 
soon perceived that Carolyn was growing white after 
her glance at him. 

“I hope you’ll be kind enough to speak to me, 
Miss Ffolliott,” he said, as soon as he could com- 
mand his voice. 

When he had spoken thus, he was afraid there 
was too much pleading in his tone. 


“ TOO MUCH FOR ANY WOMAN TO FORGIVE” 237 

He had often pictured himself as writing to her, 
explaining everything, and beseeching her to pardon 
him ; but he had never quite dared, even in his 
thoughts, to stand before her as he did now. And 
yet he had come to this shore because he longed 
to come ; he must have known in the bottom of his 
thoughts that here it would be possible to meet her, 
though he might guide his movements so as to make 
such a meeting improbable. 

“ Certainly,” Carolyn answered, promptly, “ I will 
speak to you. I am sorry to see you looking so 
ill” 

“You need not be sorry. I have been ill, but 
I am greatly improved now. I hope to go to work 
in the fall.” 

He turned about somewhat confusedly to look for 
his hat, which was lying on the rock. He picked it 
up and seemed to be going. But he did not go. In 
the midst of his painful consciousness was the wish 
that Leander were not present. But the boy was 
quite visible, and was plainly listening to every word, 
while his eyes dwelt first upon one face and then 
upon the other. Was he scenting a “ secret ? ” He 
still retained his love of secrets, and it must be a 
jolly one that could make these two people look pre- 
cisely like this. Things had been very odd indeed 


238 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

the time the Vireo did not come back ; perhaps he 
really would find out now. 

“ Did you bring your fishing-rod, Lee ? ” asked 
Carolyn. 

“ Yep,” said the boy, but he did not stir. 

The girl turned. “Come,” she said, “and let us 
see how it works.” She spoke with perfect stead- 
iness, but a small, bright red spot had now appeared 
on each cheek. 

“ Miss Ffolliott ! ” exclaimed Lawrence. 

She paused and looked back at him. Lawrence 
had now forgotten the boy ; he had almost forgotten 
everything but that he must try and get this girl’s 
forgiveness. For the instant nothing in the world, 
save her forgiveness, seemed worth anything. 

“ I wanted to ask you one question,” he said, 
humbly. 

He did not know that his hand which held his hat 
was trembling pitiably ; but Carolyn saw it tremble. 
She seemed to hesitate, then she said, quickly : 

“ Leander, run down to the beach and wait for 
me.” 

Leander mumbled something, but he did not quite 
dare to disobey when his sister spoke like that. He 
walked away as slowly as he could possibly move, 
and he was continually turning his head back to look 


“ TOO MUCH FOR ANY WOMAN TO FORGIVE” 239 

at these two. But even at this gait he did in time 
reach the little sandy beach, and they saw him 
sitting there and piling up sand over his feet. 

Now Carolyn turned and asked, “ Did you wish to 
say something to me, Mr. Lawrence ?” and immedi- 
ately, “ Will you please sit down ? You look very 
ill.” 

“No; I will stand. I won’t detain you long. I 
wanted to ask you if you think you can ever forgive 
me ? ” 

Lawrence’s voice was low and shaken ; his hollow 
eyes, darkly marked beneath them, were fixed on the 
girl’s face. 

She hesitated ; he hastened to say, “ I hope you 
don’t think I mean for not marrying you, — I know 
well enough that that was a happy chance for you, — 
but for the grossly insulting way in which I left you. 
It is very little to say it was not planned — that I did 
not seek — that it was a chance — that — ” 

But the man would not intimate what part Pru- 
dence had acted on that evening. He resumed, in 
a harsh tone, “ Chance gave me the opportunity to 
be a villain, and I embraced the opportunity. Now 
can you forgive me ? ” 

Still Carolyn was silent. She was standing with- 
out the least movement, save the tremulous motion 


240 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


of the knot of silk at her throat. She was not look- 
ing at her companion ; her eyes were fixed on the 
ground. 

Presently he began again. “ I see how it is. It 
is too much to beg of any woman to forgive. Now 
I ought to ask you to forgive me for asking you to 
forgive. Can you do that ? ” 

He did not wait for an answer to this last question. 
Still with his hat in his trembling hand, he turned 
away and began to descend the rock. But a sudden 
and imperative physical weakness made him stumble. 
He could have cursed that weakness. 

Carolyn sprang forward ; she caught hold of his 
arm. 

“ You are \M ! ” she said, in a half whisper. “ Will 
you sit down here for a moment ? ” 

From very helplessness Lawrence was obliged to 
comply. He sat down ; he did not try to speak. 
He had nothing more to say ; and he was beginning 
to know how foolish he had been to say as much as 
he had said. 

Carolyn sat down also, a few feet away from him. 
The tide had turned, and the waves were splashing 
intermittently against the base of the rocks below 
them ; out in the bay the water had assumed that 
look of new life which the incoming of the tide 


“ TOO MUCH FOR ANY WOMAN TO FORGIVE” 24 1 

produces. The girl dully wondered why, at such 
a moment, she should note all this. But she did 
think of these phenomena more keenly than when 
her mind was at liberty. And at the same time it 
seemed as if she saw nothing and knew nothing but 
that ghastly face with its terribly brilliant eyes that 
had been looking at her like eyes from some other 
world. 

She moved her hands now, as if some movement, 
however slight, would be a help to her. 

This was Prudence Ffolliott’s husband. And it 
was plain that he was not happy. But perhaps that 
was because he was ill. She tried not to be confused 
by the pity his physical weakness excited in her. 
She wished to be kind, but not too kind. She won- 
dered what was the exact way in which she ought to 
behave. 

She glanced swiftly at Lawrence. He was sitting 
with his hands resting on his knees, his gaze fixed 
unseeingly before him ; she knew that he did not see 
anything ; and she knew how indignant he would be 
if he realized how weak he looked. She must not 
wound him. Her eyes melted, her whole face softened 
indescribably, and her voice, when she spoke, partook 
of this change. 

“You see, don’t you,” he said, quickly, “that all 


242 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


that I can say to you is to beg for pardon. After 
that I will not annoy you.” 

“ I forgive you,” she answered, at last. “ I forgave 
you long ago.” 

“ God bless you for that ! Oh, Caro, God bless 
you for that ! ” 

The words burst from his white lips, and the old 
familiar name came unconsciously. 

How differently he was behaving from the way he 
had meant to behave if he ever saw Carolyn again ! 
When he had spoken thus, some consciousness of 
this fact seemed to come to him. He sat up more 
erectly. Then he rose to his feet. 

“ It was all a mistake, our engagement,” said Caro- 
lyn, now speaking as if she were referring to the 
affairs of some other woman. “ I am to blame. I 
ought never to have allowed it. Let us not mention 
the subject again.” 

“ Very well. But you have been to blame in 
nothing. Good-by.” 

Lawrence walked slowly down towards the beach 
where Leander was still piling up sand. He did not 
even see that youth, or hear him when he shouted, 
“ Remember about Devil.” The man walked on as 
fast as he could. The boy gazed after him, mutter- 
ing that he should like to know what was the matter, 


“ TOO MUCH FOR ANY WOMAN TO FORGIVE. ” 243 

anyhow. He immediately climbed the rocks again. 
Evidently his sister did not hear him, and Leander 
stood gazing at her in silence, with a growing con- 
viction that he had by no means fathomed the 
matter, but that he would do so yet. 

Carolyn was sitting crouched forward, with her 
knees drawn up and her hands over her face. 

“ If she’s crying, she’ll be whimpering so I can 
hear her,” thought the boy. But she did not 
whimper so that any one could hear her. 

Leander waited until he became impatient ; then 
he called out that if she wanted to see the fishing- 
rod she had better come along. 

The girl rose immediately and accompanied her 
brother ; she succeeded in displaying a proper de- 
gree of interest in the rod, so that its owner offered 
no criticism on her conduct. 

As for Lawrence, he did not stop in his walk, 
following the shore until he reached the hotel. 
He had not expected to find his wife in, but she 
was at a table in their sitting-room, apparently writ- 
ing letters. The crow was on the back of her chair, 
occasionally thrusting his head about so that he 
could look over her shoulder, as if he could read 
the words she had written. 

Lawrence sat down quickly. He thrust his hand 


244 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


into the breast-pocket of his coat and drew out his 
cigar-case. Having selected a cigar, he did not light 
it, but sat looking at it. 

Prudence laid down her pen. 

“You look rather done up,” she remarked, in an 
indifferent voice. 

“ Yes, I feel so,” was the response. 

“ I shouldn’t think you’d walk so far,” she said, 
with the same indifference. 

There was no answer to this. 

Presently Lawrence said, “ I’ve given Devil 
away.” 

At this the bird drew himself up and looked at the 
speaker. 

“What ?” came somewhat sharply from Prudence. 

Lawrence repeated his words. 

“ But I’m not going to part with the crow,” said 
Prudence, positively. “He knows all my secrets,” — 
here she laughed, — “ and, besides, he’s my mascot. 
No, I sha’n’t part with him.” 

“ He hasn’t brought you any great luck, it ‘seems 
to me.” 

Lawrence put his unlighted cigar back in the case, 
stretched out his legs, and gazed at the toes of his 
shoes. 

“That’s true enough,” returned Prudence, “but 


“ TOO MUCH FOR ANY WOMAN TO FORGIVE. ” 245 

I’m always hoping he will. I’m going to keep him. 
To whom did you give him ? ” 

“ Leander Ffolliott.” 

Prudence started perceptibly. She looked for an 
instant intently at her husband, her eyes narrowing 
in their old way as she did so. 

“ Have you been there ? ” she asked. 

“ No ; I saw the boy on the rocks.” 

“ Perhaps you saw the boy’s sister also.” 

“Yes, I did.” 

“ Oh!” 

Prudence tipped her head back and laughed ring- 
ingly, her eyes still upon her husband’s face. There 
was a little added color on her cheeks. The laugh 
was somehow so exasperating, so strangely in- 
sulting, that Lawrence rose to his feet in a fury. 
But he sat down again directly and resumed his 
old position. 

“You seem to be amused,” he remarked, coldly. 

“Yes.” She laughed again. “I was imagining 
the meeting, — such astounding propriety as I know 
characterized it. You would do the right thing, and 
Caro is nothing if not proper. Caro is a darling 
girl, and I love her dearly, but you must confess 
that she is proper, Rodney dear.” 

“Yes, I confess that,” he said, grimly. 


246 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

“ Certainly ; she would never take the least little 
part in a French novel.” 

“ Never,” he agreed, with emphasis. 

Prudence gazed at her husband a moment without 
speaking. Her eyes changed. She rose and went 
to him ; she stood by his side, put an arm lightly 
about his neck, and bent down slightly towards him. 
He sat perfectly quiet. 

“ I’m sorry you allowed yourself to get so tired,” 
she said. 

“ Oh, I shall get over that,” he replied, care- 
lessly. 

“Yes, but- it hurts you.” 

He smiled in silence. 

She moved slightly nearer. There was the old 
indefinite something in her manner which had once 
charmed him so. 

“Don’t reproach yourself,” she said, pleadingly; 
“you know you didn’t love her then.” 

No answer. 

Prudence bent nearer and kissed her husband’s 
lips. But they did not respond. 

“You loved me,” she murmured, kissing him 
again. 

In the silence that followed, during which Law- 
rence sat like a stone, Prudence gradually drew away 


“ TOO MUCH FOR ANY WOMAN TO FORGIVE. ” 247 

from him. She stood looking at him, and the soft- 
ness left her face. 

“ Perhaps you don’t love me any more,” she said, 
finally. 

Lawrence roused himself. . Everything seemed 
black before him, but he was conscious of trying to 
be gentle and courteous. 

“ Perhaps I never loved you,” he answered. 

“Oh!” 

It was strange how the woman’s countenance had 
darkened ; it did not look grieved, but angry. At 
that instant, if her face had worn a different look, 
Lawrence’s heart might have suddenly melted and 
some things have happened differently. But no, he 
told himself afterward, how could she change her- 
self ? What was to be would be. The old fatalistic 
saying recurred to him again and again. But what 
was he, that he should blame any one for any- 
thing ? 

“ Prudence,” he said. He put out his thin, burning 
hand and took hers ; but in a moment she withdrew 
it. She stood before him, her graceful, erect figure 
in a blaze of sunshine that poured in through the 
window behind her. 

Lawrence wondered that her touch could give him 
no thrill now ; his blood ran coldly beneath her kiss. 


. 248 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


Was he beginning to know her ? or was it that he 
had known her when she had so enthralled him ? 

These questions went through his mind so persist- 
ently that he was confused. 

- “ I have been a puppet in your hands,” he said. 
He added, with an inexplicable smile, “But then, 
there was Mark Antony.” 

He leaned wearily back in his chair. Prudence 
went to her own chair and sat down in it. The 
crow hopped round to her knee ; he sat there look- 
ing at her, first with one eye and then with the 
other. She thought it was curious that she should 
recall, just at this moment, that night she had spent 
in the Boston hotel after the Vireo had been run 
down, the night before she had been married. She 
and the crow had been together then, and she had 
thought of killing him. It seemed to her that the 
bird had called her a liar — a liar. She tried to throw 
off this remembrance. * 

She looked at the man sitting so wearily opposite 
her. So he believed he had never loved her ? Well, 
she still believed that she had loved him. It was 
. galling that he should have told her that. He ought 
to have known better than to say such a thing. So 
she had been a kind of Cleopatra to him ? Well, he 
was not a Mark Antony to be held by love ; but he 


“ TOO MUCH FOR ANY WOMAN TO FORGIVE . ” 249 

hadn’t loved, he said. She also was becoming con- 
fused. She put her cold fingers up to her temples 
and pressed them there for an instant. 

“Never shall amorous Antony 
Kiss kingdoms out for you.” 

Where had she read those lines ? But it was no 
matter where she had read them. 

“ Your interview with Carolyn seems to have had 
a disastrous effect,” she said. “What did she say to 
you ? ” 

“ She said she forgave me.” 

“ Indeed ! ” 

“ Yes ; I asked her, you know.” 

“ You asked her?” she said, with an elevation of 
the eyebrows. 

Lawrence nodded. In a moment his wife said, 
“Now I should really hate to have a man ask me to 
forgive him for not marrying me. I should hate that. 
I should want somebody to come and thrash that 
man for me.” 

Lawrence raised his head and met his companion’s 
sparkling glance of resentment. 

“ Of all the stupid things you ever did, Rodney 
Lawrence, that was the most stupid.” 

“ But I didn’t ask her precisely that,” he said. 


250 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


“ I told her she was lucky not to have me for a 
husband ; but I did beg for forgiveness for the way 
in which I left her.” 

“ Oh ! ” 

Prudence’s way of uttering this interjection was 
as if she had struck a stinging blow across her com- 
panion’s face. He winced inwardly, but still he met 
the stroke bravely. He had told her this in accord- 
ance with a resolve he had made long ago that he, 
on his part, would have no concealments from his 
wife. Perhaps the discovery that she sometimes 
prevaricated, sometimes colored simple statements, 
sometimes told downright falsehoods, had strength- 
ened this resolve in him. On his side he would have 
simple, straightforward truth. But what was he, that 
he should rebuke her ? Had he not broken the most 
sacred word a man can give, — broken it in the most 
insulting way possible ? This thought came to him 
when he was tempted to rebuke. Then he would tell 
himself, with a corroding bitterness of feeling, that 
as a man sows so he must reap. He was reaping 
now. 

“ I suppose you think you love Carolyn.” Pru- 
dence said this after a silence. 


CHAPTER XVI. 

TETE - X - TETE. 

Lawrence allowed himself an uneasy movement 
in his chair, and he did not answer. 

Prudence sat stroking the head and neck of the 
crow, which still remained on her knee. 

“ Since we are having such a very interesting con- 
versation,” she said, “pray let’s continue it. There’s 
nothing so spicy and agreeable as a tete-a-tete be- 
tween husband and wife who are thoroughly dis- 
illusioned ; don’t you think so ? ” 

Lawrence said nothing. He glanced about the 
room like one who would be glad to escape. He was 
weary and faint, but he would not seem weary if he 
could help it ; and there was a weight like lead on 
his heart. He thought, with seeming triviality, that 
he had never before quite known what that phrase, 
“a heart as heavy as lead,” meant. 

“ You have decided now that you never loved me,” 
she continued. 


251 


252 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

“ Why need we discuss that question ? ” he asked. 

“ Oh, because it suits me to discuss it. I feel an- 
alytical this morning. Let us dissect a few feelings. 
My husband has just had an interview with an old 
flame, and now he comes and tells me he thinks 
he never loved me. You must believe that I 
shall be interested in this subject. Pray, Rodney, if 
I may ask, what did you feel that made it possible 
for you to take me to Boston that night ? ” 

Lawrence sat gazing at Prudence as she spoke. 
He had a fanciful notion that his heart was like ashes 
as well as like lead. How could he have been so 
blind ? He could not now imagine that he had felt 
what he had felt for Prudence. Some one has said 
that there is nothing so dead as a dead passion. 

“ I suppose,” he said, slowly and drearily, “ that I 
had a fancy for you. You infatuated me ; it was a 
kind of intoxication.” 

“ Do you eliminate passion from love ? ” 

She put the question as if she were making an 
inquiry concerning a symptom of disease. 

“ No, but love is not all passion. It has a basis of 
tenderness and respect ; it is not a delirium.” 

“ From which you recover to despise yourself ? ” 
She seemed to add this to his sentence. 

Lawrence rose ; he stood a moment in front of his 


TETE-A-TETE. 


253 


wife, gazing down at her. He was bewildered by the 
tumult of his emotions, by his strange indifference to 
Prudence, and, perhaps more than all, by his physical 
weakness. 

He turned towards the couch near and stretched 
himself out upon it. His wife rose and put a shawl 
over him, and he said, “ Thank you,” in a mechanical 
way. Then he asked, trying to prevent his voice 
from showing irritation : 

“Is it really necessary for us to continue this 
talk ? ” 

“ Perhaps not ; but if I prefer to go on, dear 
Rodney ? ” 

Lawrence closed his eyes. 

“ Go on,” he said. 

“ How kind of you to let me have the last word ! 
But you see I think I’ll take up the study of psychol- 
ogy, with you and me as object-lessons. Can’t we 
mount a scrap of our feelings on a bit of glass and 
put it under that microscope of yours ? Really, I 
didn’t think I should come to look back almost with 
envy to that time when I nursed mamma at Carlsbad. 
At least I wasn’t married then, and Lord Maxwell 
came to the place. To be sure, he had symptoms, 
and a man with symptoms isn’t much better than a 
block of wood to flirt with.” 


254 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

Prudence’s voice was running on with a semblance 
of gaiety ; and now she laughed. 

“ I wonder what sort of a flirter Caro finds Lord 
Maxwell. Of course he’s stupid, for is he not a man ? 
I heard Mrs. Yorke say yesterday that people began 
to talk as if Maxwell would marry Carolyn. She 
may be the countess in the family, after all. Then 
mamma can say, * My niece, Lady Maxwell,’ instead 
of ‘ My daughter, Lady Maxwell.’ Of course it won’t 
be quite so fine, but it will do. I suppose Caro will 
visit every cottage on his lordship’s estate, and will 
make no end of flannel petticoats. In novels, you 
know, the good lady carries petticoats and strong 
soups to the poor, and reads to them. Can’t you see 
Caro doing that, Rodney ? ” 

Lawrence lay with his eyes closed. He opened 
them now to glance at his wife. She was look- 
ing full at him, and their mutual gaze met as two 
shining bits of steel might meet. It almost seemed 
as if one listening might have heard the clash of 
metal on metal. 

Lawrence immediately closed his eyes again. 

“ Can’t you see Caro doing that ? ” repeated Pru- 
dence, relentlessly. 

“ I haven’t an active imagination like you,” he 
answered, at last. 


TETE-A- TETE v 255 

“ What a pity ! ” 

Prudence, after a moment, turned to her writing 
again. Her husband lay there, and heard her pen 
going over the paper. 

He began to think more calmly, and it came to 
him that he had not done a good thing in telling 
Prudence that he had never loved her. There was 
no need of his saying that. He would give much 
now if he could recall those words ; but he knew he 
could not remove the sting of them. What a brute 
he had been ! What a very different person he was, 
every way, from the person he had meant to be ! 
He did not feel able to understand it all. He 
wished he could banish the memory of Carolyn’s 
lovely, truthful face. He was sorry he had seen 
her. Did human beings always want the thing 
they could not have ? 

For what seemed a long time, he heard his wife’s 
pen on the paper ; then the noise grew indistinct, 
and Lawrence knew that he was going to sleep, and 
was thankful for the knowledge. 

But he did not sleep long. Nothing special awak- 
ened him, however. He opened his eyes ; they rested 
on Prudence, who had stopped writing. She was 
sitting with her hands folded on her lap, gazing 
at him. How old and hard her face appeared ! 


256 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


She smiled immediately, smiled brilliantly and with- 
out any softness. 

“ I was waiting for you to waken,” she said. 

“ Well ? ” 

“ I hadn’t quite had the last word yet,” she said, 
with a slight laugh. 

Lawrence sat up. 

“ I was a brute to tell you I had never loved you,” 
he exclaimed, abruptly. 

“ Never mind ; we must always tell the truth, you 
know,” she returned, lightly. 

He said nothing. He was trying to brush the 
clouds away from his brain and think clearly. 

“ And since we must speak truth,”' she went on, 
“I was waiting to tell you I was distractedly in 
love with you, — it was no make-believe, — but that 
I was deadly tired of the whole thing in a few 
months. It’s not quite a year yet, is it ? That’s 
why I wanted to amuse myself with Mr. Meramble, 
or somebody. But when you flung Meramble into 
the ocean you did it so well, and he seemed so insig- 
nificant, that I was almost in love with you again. 
But it didn’t last. Now I’ve had the last word ; I 
imagine we understand each other.” 

She rose and stretched her arms above her head. 
She glanced at her watch. 


TETE-A-TETE. 


257 


“I’m going sailing with Mrs. Yorke and a few 
others. I hope you won’t need anything before I 
come back. Don’t you think you’d better try to 
have another nap? You look very tired. And I 
hope you won’t forget your medicine, and all that 
kind of thing.” 

She went into the inner room, and in a few mo- 
ments came back with hat on and parasol in her hand. 

Lawrence was walking back and forth in the 
room. He paused near his wife, and laid his hand 
on her arm. 

“ I hope you won’t remember the foolish things 
a poor half-sick fellow says,” he began. “ I hope, 
since we are to spend our lives together, we may 
be on friendly terms, Prudence.” 

Prudence was occupied in furling her parasol, and 
in fastening the folds. She did not raise her eyes, 
as she answered, “ Of course we shall be friendly. 
You didn’t think I should begin to quarrel with you, 
did you ? I’m not quite so vulgar as that. I’m not 
going to mend your stockings, or warm your slip- 
pers, or that kind of thing, you know. We are like 
other people, that’s all.” 

Prudence now glanced up at her companion. 
There was a fire in her eyes that blazed still 
more, as she continued : 


258 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


“ I imagine I have a great deal of temperament, 
as the French say. “Now, good-by. I don’t know 
whether we shall sail down to Plymouth, or not.” 

She left the room. The crow walked after her to 
the door, made a guttural sound, then occupied him- 
self by pulling threads from the carpet. 

Lawrence leaned against a window-casing, and 
gazed vaguely at the bird. 

“ What did she mean by that ? ” he asked, aloud. 
“ What is it to have a great deal of temperament ? 
Perhaps I have it myself.” 

He turned towards the window, from which he 
could see the ocean. 

“Not quite a year ago. Really, it’s horrible to 
come to this in less than a year. There they go. 
How charming Yorke thinks her! See him take 
her parasol and carefully hold it between her and 
the sun. His wife is carrying her own sunshade. 
See Prudence look up at her cavalier and smile at 
him. Oh, what an egregious ass I have been. And 
now let me drink what I have brewed.” 

He turned from the window. He gave a short 
laugh. “ Why, I am actually becoming a soliloquizer. 
To how much lower depths shall I sink, I wonder ? ” 

After a short time he left the hotel, and walked 
out to a group of rocks that at low tide stood up 


TETE-A-TETE. * 


259 


bare and brown in the sunlight. Just now no one 
was there so he chose them as a resting-place. His 
tall, gaunt form, as it made its way slowly along the 
beach, looked out of tune with its gay surroundings. 

When he had seated himself, a sail came gaily 
round the little promontory, and glided within a few 
rods of him. Some one waved a handkerchief at 
him ; he lifted his hat mechanically, and saw that 
it was his wife who was saluting him. Then the 
craft gathered speed, and reeled away out into 
the great blue space. 

Prudence, sitting in the bows, leaned forward as 
if to greet still more quickly the immensity and 
grandeur of the sea. She never tired of the ocean. 
Her whole face seemed to kindle ; beautiful curves 
came to her lips as she sat there silently. The sen- 
suous nature drank in, with a kind of dainty greedi- 
ness, the scene before her. To love the beautiful 
passionately, to be moved strongly by it, and revel 
in it, and be drunk with it, — perhaps Prudence 
did not actually formulate the belief that to do this 
made her a refined person, somehow above the 
merely upright human being; but she certainly had 
a nebulous conviction to that effect. She had an 
unexpressed contempt for those people who pre- 
tended to be guided by their consciences, or by what 


260 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


they called religious principle. Of course it was all 
a matter of temperament, she said. She once re- 
marked, with one of her light laughs, that she did not 
know what it was to be a pantheist, but she rather 
thought that she was one ; she would be either that or 
a devout member of the Roman or Greek Church, — 
something which had a gorgeous ritual into which 
she could plunge her senses and stimulate them with 
sumptuous dreams, and images, and music, and per- 
fume of incense. Yes, after all, she believed she 
preferred that kind of thing to being a pantheist ; 
though, on second thoughts, perhaps pantheism in- 
cluded all these. 


CHAPTER XVII. 


“ ARE YOU GOING TO MARRY LORD MAXWELL ? ” 

Carolyn Ffolliott was sitting on the piazza at 
Savin Hill, sitting in much the same position and 
with the same surroundings as when we first met 
her in the opening chapter of these chronicles. 
Only it was a year later. A year usually writes 
very little on the human face, though it may have 
brought experiences which will in time make their 
imprint visible. 

Carolyn was reading ; her brother Leander was 
sitting on the lawn, trying to unravel the tail of a 
kite ; her mother was walking slowly back and forth, 
watching her son. There was the sea, just as it had 
been ; and apparently there were the same sails, 
and the same coal-barges drawn by tugs, and the 
same steamers far away in the offing. 

“ It’s rather stupid here this summer, don’t you 
think?” remarked Mrs. Ffolliott; “and I’m afraid 
Leander isn’t having as good a time as usual. Are 
you, Lee dear ? ” 


262 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


“Yep, bully,” was the prompt reply. “Only 
there’s Prue ain’t here, you know.” 

As if as a sort of comment upon this remark, 
there was the sound of steps at the other end of the 
veranda, and a young woman in a bicycling suit came 
walking forward. There was a bright color on her 
face, but then she had been “biking,” and it was 
warm. 

Carolyn, as she saw Prudence, rose quickly, her 
own face growing red, a spark coming to her 
eyes. 

Prudence came on, going straight to Mrs. Ffol- 
liott. 

“ Dear aunty,” she exclaimed, “ I’ve wanted to see 
you so” — kiss — “that I finally decided I would 
come over” — kiss — “and I was sure you couldn’t 
bear any malice after all this long while. You dear 
Aunt Tishy, you, you were always as much like a 
mother as my own mother herself ; and then you 
didn’t have rheumatism, either ; so you were better- 
natured, you know.” 

Here the speaker laughed excitedly. She still 
held her aunt’s hand in both her own. She did not 
seem, at this moment, to see her cousin, who was 
gazing steadily at her. 

“You’re not going to turn me out, are you, Aunt 


“ GOING TO MATTY LOTD MAXWELL ?” 263 

Tishy? You don’t know how I’ve missed Savin 
Hill. It’s more like home to me than any place in 
the world. You won’t turn me out ? ” 

In the bottom of her heart Mrs. Ffolliott was 
thankful for this diversion. She remembered, first, 
that time did not usually hang heavily where Pru- 
dence was ; but then, immediately she remembered, 
secondly, that Prudence had run away with Carolyn’s 
lover on the eve of their marriage ; she had not for- 
gotten that, — how could she ? But — oh, dear, how 
complicated things were ! 

She now kissed her niece with an air of not know- 
ing what she was doing, as indeed she hardly did 
know. Then she began by saying she was sure, she 
was very sure she was sure — and just here Leander 
dashed up and cried out that this was the j oiliest 
thing that could happen, and he’d get his wheel, and 
they’d go down the east road, and he’d beat her all 
holler in no time. 

“ Perhaps you’ll beat me, but you won’t beat me 
holler, I’m positive,” she responded. 

She shook hands with the boy ; then she stooped 
and kissed his forehead ; whereupon, to the amaze- 
ment of the witnesses, Leander flung his arms about 
her neck and kissed her cheek resoundingly. 

When Prudence lifted her head, the girl standing 


264 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

there watching her was surprised to see that there 
were tears in her cousin’s eyes. 

We are often surprised when people whom we 
think rather wicked and false show signs of natural 
feeling or affection. 

Carolyn was moved, too. She was a tender-hearted 
creature, who could never bear to see anything suf- 
fer ; and she was sure that Rodney was not happy 
with his wife. No man who looked as he did was 
a happy man. If she had believed that he was 
happy, would she have been able to do as she did 
now ? Who can tell ? The human heart, besides being 
“desperately wicked,” is a very mysterious organ. 

Carolyn advanced a few steps, and the two looked 
into each other’s eyes for the first time since Pru- 
dence had been Rodney’s wife. In the eyes of Pru- 
dence were pleading, and deprecation, and just 
enough unhappiness to win upon her cousin ; and 
all these feelings were also truly in her heart. She 
was one of those subtly wise women who know how 
to make use of genuine emotion. 

Carolyn did not put out her hand. She could not 
quite do that, — not yet, anyway. She said, “ How 
do you do, Prudence ? ” in quite the ordinary way, 
and as if the two had met the day before, and 
nothing particular had happened since. 


“ GOING TO MARRY LORD MAXWELL ?” 265 

“ Very well, thanks. Are you well, Cousin 
Caro ? ” was the response. 

To this Carolyn answered that her health had 
never been better. Then Mrs. Ffolliott, with some 
nervousness in her manner, asked after Rodney’s 
health, adding that she had heard very distressing 
rumors about him. 

Carolyn looked away from Prudence as the latter 
made reply : 

“ Rodney, poor boy, is getting to be a terrible 
hypochondriac. I don’t know what we shall do 
with him. We must all try to amuse him.” 

As she pronounced the word “ all ” she glanced 
markedly at Carolyn, who was gazing off to the 
horizon. 

“ Then he isn’t really ill ? ” asked Carolyn, turning 
calmly towards her guest and speaking as if referring 
to some stranger. 

“ She certainly has good stuff in her,” was the 
mental comment of Prudence as she answered, aloud, 
“Not very ill, I’m sure. A few functional disturb- 
ances of some of the organs, I forget just what 
ones ; the liver, I imagine, and heart.” 

“I should think being at the seashore might 
benefit him,” said Mrs. Ffolliott, solicitously. 

“Oh, yes, of course it will.” 


266 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


Thus Prudence dismissed the subject. 

She walked to where Carolyn had taken her place 
immediately after greeting her, a pillar of the piazza 
against which she was leaning. 

“Caro,” she said, softly, “let me see you a mo- 
ment, please.” 

Carolyn showed the surprise she felt. She lifted 
her brows interrogatively as she asked, “ Do you 
mean alone ? ” 

“ Oh, yes ; what can one say with Leander 
present ? ” 

“ Let us go down to the beach, then,” answered 
Carolyn, and the two started, being followed by 
Leander, until that person consented to go back on 
condition that Prue would return and ride a race 
with him that very morning. 

On the ridge of dry sand above high-water mark 
Carolyn and her cousin sat down. Neither spoke 
for some time ; Carolyn was resolved not to be the 
first to break the silence. She would not aid Pru- 
dence in whatever she had to say, and she was so 
weakly human that she could hardly help shrinking 
a little away from her as she sat beside her. But 
she did not shrink ; she sat with that utter quiet 
of which she was capable, hardly an eyelash stirring. 

As for Prudence, she put one hand down in the 


“GOING TO MATTY LOTI) MAXWELL?” 267 

warm sand and burrowed into its depths, trying to 
absorb herself in the action. She had come 
on an impulse to see Carolyn and to gain an 
entrance to Savin Hill again. It had been 
uncomfortable to have to reply that she did not 
know, when people put inquiries to her about the 
Ffolliotts. And she was tired of suffering this sort 
of banishment. She wanted her aunt and cousin 
to be reconciled to her. People in the end always 
thus far had been obliged to become reconciled to 
her. This, to be sure, was rather a difficult matter. 

How very irritating Caro’s face was ! This she 
felt as she glanced at that face calmly contem- 
plating the movements of a dory which a man was 
rowing out to his fishing-smack. 

“ Caro, dear,” she at last begun. 

Carolyn turned promptly towards her, and waited. 

This waiting was, for some reason, inexpressibly 
exasperating to Prudence, whose face flushed, and 
who was obliged to wait on her own account before 
she could speak as she wished to speak. Evidently 
she was to receive not the slightest help from her 
companion. 

With the rapidity of lightning, Prudence changed 
her plan as to what she would say. There came 
a certain line on either side of her mouth, a line 


268 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


which Carolyn had seen before and wondered 
about. 

“ Do you want to know the very inmost, secret 
reason for my coming, Caro ? ” she asked. 

She removed her hand from the sand and care- 
fully dusted her fingers with her handkerchief, 
smiling to herself as she did so. 

“If you’d like to tell,” was the answer. 

“ I’m dying to tell,” she said, turning now fully 
towards her cousin and fixing her eyes upon her 
face. 

“ Then,” said Caro, placidly, “ if you’re dying to 
tell, I’ll try to wait until you speak.” 

Prudence felt her fingers tingle with a vixenish 
desire to slap the face before her. Really, was Caro 
so provoking as this in the old days ? 

“ Well, then, I came to congratulate you, my 
dear.” 

« 

“ Congratulate me ? ” 

“Certainly. I hear one thing said every time 
your name is mentioned.” 

Here Prudence came to a full stop, and tried to 
be patient until Carolyn should ask a question. But 
Carolyn resumed her watching of the man in the 
dory, who had now nearly reached the smack. 

Prudence began to plunge her hand once more 


“ GOING TO MARRY LORD MAXWELL ?” 269 

in the sand. Her face was growing red. What had 
changed matters between her and the girl beside 
her? Formerly she had easily maintained the 
ascendency ; now, indefinitely, she felt that she 
had lost this ascendency. • 

There was color in Carolyn’s face, — her blood 
she could not control, — but her features were as 
calm as if she could not think or feel. This one 
fact made Prudence afraid that when she did speak 
she might stammer from sheer anger and astonish- 
ment. Was this the cousin whom she had consid- 
ered a sort of namby-pamby, goody-goody girl who 
would be easily controlled ? 

It wasn’t of the least use to wait for some word 
from Carolyn ; so Prudence said : 

“You seem so calm, I suppose everything is all 
settled.” 

“ What is settled ? ” 

“ Your marriage to Lord Maxwell.” 

For reply Carolyn gave a glance of contemptuous 
interrogation. 

“ Oh, yes,” Prudence reasserted, “ and let me tell 
you that every girl is not so lucky.” 

No response. 

“ I suppose you’re flesh and blood, and not wood ! ” 
she cried, indignantly. 


270 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

“ I don’t think I’m wood.” 

“ I’ve a great mind to pinch you and see.” 

Very well.” 

“ Caro, do you remember that time when you told 
me how you loved Rodney ? ” 

Now the girl winced visibly beneath this cruel 
thrust. But she answered, promptly, “Yes.” 

“ Well, I don’t believe a word of it ; I don’t believe 
you could ever love anybody, — lucky creature that 
you are ! ” 

Carolyn looked for one instant at the eyes fixed 
upon her. Then Prudence suddenly threw her arms 
about her cousin, and exclaimed, with an outburst of 
tears : 

“ Oh, do forgive me ! I’m half crazed ! I don’t 
know what I’m saying ! I have to suffer so, and no- 
body seems to think a woman like me can suffer ! ” 

Carolyn remained rigidly quiet ; she would not 
pretend to respond to this embrace ; inwardly she 
turned sick at it. Yes, of course Prudence could 
suffer; and she ought to suffer. 

Carolyn was astonished at the vigor of her own 
resentment. And why had Rodney Lawrence’s wife 
come here ? To spy out the land ? Well, she should 
not be much rewarded if that had been her object. 

Finding that her embrace and her tears seemed 


“ GOING TO MARRY LORD MAXWELL?” 2? I 

productive of very little, Prudence sat up and put 
her handkerchief to her face for a moment. 

“ I know,” she said from its folds, “that there are 
some things a woman cannot forgive. But, though 
I stole your lover away from you, I’ve not been 
supremely happy since. And I know you used to 
pity unhappiness.” 

“ I hope I’m still sorry for any one who is 
unhappy,” said Carolyn, steadily. 

“ I suppose you’re going to marry Lord Maxwell ; 
aren’t you ? ” 

This question was put with abrupt rapidity, and 
Prudence dropped her handkerchief and darted a 
look at the face beside her. 

Carolyn could not tell why she suddenly resolved 
not to reply to this question ; perhaps she made this 
resolution because of the eager curiosity which leaped 
from her cousin’s eyes as she spoke. She did not 
answer ; she averted her face lest Prudence should 
read the truth there, but she was conscious of a sense 
of shame as she did so. 

“ Won’t you tell me ? ” persisted Prudence. 

“I would rather not say anything on the subject,” 
was the response. 

Prudence’s eyes flashed fire. Until now she had 
not in the least believed the rumor. 


272 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

Was this girl — this — this — oh, was she to 
become Lady Maxwell, while she, Prudence Ffol- 
liott, had cut herself off from such a congenial career 
as that with a husband whom she could twist this 
way and that — while she, because of the passion of 
a moment, was tied to a man who was tired of her, 
and whom just now she was sure she hated ? 
Thoughts like these rushed hotly through her mind 
in a confused troop. 

So, after all, Carolyn was just like other girls. 
Why, of course she was. Why shouldn’t she be ? 
And Maxwell was now very wealthy. Prudence sat 
up straight. She thrust her handkerchief into the 
pocket of her little cycling- jacket. 

“ I beg your pardon,” she said, with great suavity. 
“ I didn’t know but that you might be willing to 
tell me. I suppose I must wait, however, until the 
announcement is made.” 

Having said this, she rose and brushed the sand 
from her garments. She remarked that she would 
run up to the house and have a spin with Leander. 

Carolyn walked up with her, and the two conversed 
affably, and parted with great politeness on both sides. 

But as Prudence mounted her wheel outside, her 
hands trembled, and she was white instead of being 
flushed. 


“ GOING TO MARRY LORD MAXWELL ?” 273 

When Leander returned, he informed his mother 
and sister that Prue wasn’t any good any more, and 
that he had beat her all holler without half trying. 
Also, as an afterthought, he said they had met Lord 
Maxwell on his wheel at the turn in the east road, 
and that the Britisher had gone on home with Prue. 


CHAPTER XVIII. 

LEANDER AS A MEANS. 

You don’t marry a woman because she is religious, 
or is inclined to tell the truth, or has this or that 
trait of mind. You are much more likely to fall 
deeply in love and to ask her to be your wife because 
of a certain droop of a lock of hair over her forehead ; 
or perhaps a particular trick of smiling lips caught 
your fancy and set it on fire. Why, I know a man 
who begged a woman to be his wife just because he 
was convinced that she had the most delightful little 
lisp in the world. Fortunately, or unfortunately, she 
refused him, and he has since united himself to a 
woman whose speech is remarkable for clearness of 
tone. I often wonder whether he wishes that she 
lisped, or if he has decided that he can be happy 
without a lisping wife. And how remarkable it is 
that, when once you have won your love, the little 
thing which attracted you, for some mysterious 
reason, ceases to be attractive, and you wish her 


274 


LEANDER AS A MEANS. 275 

mind was something more in sympathy with yours, 
or that her temperament was better fitted to yours. 
Ah, that matter of temperament ! One can put up 
with a good deal that is wrong if only the tempera- 
ments be rightly adjusted. 

I am not going to claim these as particularly my 
thoughts. They were the thoughts that were going 
rather indefinitely through Lawrence’s mind one 
afternoon as he lounged in a little sailboat opposite 
the hamlet where he was spending the summer. His 
wife had gone on an all-day’s cycling trip with Lord 
Maxwell. The two had left the hotel at about ten 
in the morning. As Prudence had put on her gloves 
before leaving her room, she had remarked to her 
husband that she hoped he would amuse himself in 
some manner while she was gone. There was Caro 
only three miles away ; he might call on her if he 
were not so odd. 

As she spoke thus, Prudence had looked steadily 
for a moment at the man standing in the window 
with his back to the light. She could not forgive 
him for refusing to visit at the Ffolliotts . His 
refusal seemed so absurd to her ; but he persisted 
in it. It was now two weeks since the time when 
she had ventured there, and had come away thinking 
that Carolyn was engaged to Lord Maxwell. Since 


276 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

then she herself had seen a good deal of that noble- 
man, but she had not quite been able to make up 
her mind as to the existence of' an engagement 
between him and her cousin. 

Lawrence did not think it worth while to reply to 
this suggestion that he call on Carolyn. He was 
engaged at this moment in intently watching Pru- 
dence as she pulled on her gloves. Having drawn 
them on, she came to his side and extended a hand 
for him to fasten the glove. 

As he performed this little office with his cus- 
tomary deftness, she regarded him with more care 
than was of late usual with her. 

Since one particular interview, she had hardly 
been able to look at him without remembering that 
he had told her that he had never loved her. As 
she had not a particle of what she called love left 
for him, it was rather surprising that this remem- 
brance should so rankle in her mind. And he did 
not betray — worse than that, she was sure he did 
not feel — the slightest irritation that she was so 
much with Lord Maxwell of late. How very dis- 
agreeable he was ! And she had loved him ; yes, 
she had certainly loved him even before the spice 
of the attempt to get him away from his betrothed 
was added to that feeling. 


LEANDER AS A MEANS. 277 

She lingered a moment after her gloves were 
fastened, still gazing at her companion. 

“ What do you think of a separation ? ” she asked. 

He looked at her quickly. “ I had not thought,” 
he answered. 

“Please think, then. You let me have the crow, 
and a generous allowance, and I’ll go my way. 
There seems no reason why life should be so 
extremely disagreeable as it has been of late. 
Good-by. Don’t get too tired, and don’t forget 
your medicine.” 

She opened the door and left the room. She 
returned immediately to say that she had promised 
Devil he might go with her to-day.* She chirruped, 
and the bird hopped out of the door, which was 
closed again. 

Lawrence stood in the window and saw the two 
ride away on their wheels, the crow flying along 
leisurely after them, alighting occasionally to inves- 
tigate something on the ground. He saw his wife 
turn and call Devil just before she wheeled out of 
sight. 

It seemed to Lawrence that he was always stand- 
ing in the window watching his wife go somewhere ; 
and always she was gay and spirited, and people 
liked to be with her. 


278 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


There was that long, light-colored Englishman, — 
was there any truth in the talk about him and Miss 
Ffolliott ? It would be rather a curious thing if 
Prudence should take two lovers from Carolyn. 

Here Lawrence shut his hand tightly, and, being 
alone, indulged himself in flinging his fist out into 
the air. But he immediately felt that this was an 
extremely childish action. 

He supposed she was not really sincere in her 
remarks about a separation, but if she were — He 
did not finish this thought. 

Recalling this day later in his life, Lawrence’s 
mind was always somewhat confused concerning it. 
He knew that after lunch he had gone out in his 
boat, and that, instead of sailing, he had dropped 
anchor not far off shore. It had been a gray, cloudy 
day, with very little wind. Lying with his hat over 
his face, Lawrence had fallen into a deep sleep ; and 
he remembered that he had dreamed horribly. When 
he fully awoke it was sunset, and the first thing he 
saw was the crescent of a very new moon set in the 
flush of the west, with its attendant star near it. 
The clouds had all dispersed ; it was a superb sunset. 
There was not a breath of wind now, so he rowed 
in towards the shore ; he was obliged to row very 
slowly, for he was not strong ; it often seemed to him 


LEANDER AS A MEANS. 


27 9 


of late as if an unconquerable weakness had fastened 
upon him, and he had a morbid conviction that his 
wife would soon have her coveted freedom. It was 
unnecessary to make arrangements for a separation. 

Lawrence went up to the hotel and tried to eat 
his dinner. Then he sat on the piazza and made 
an attempt to smoke. Some people who had been 
cycling came home, a buzz of talk and laughter 
heralding their approach. 

In the white glare of the electric lights Lawrence 
looked to see Prudence and her escort wheeling up 
the broad driveway. 

“ Saw Mrs. Lawrence and Lord Maxwell on the 
Jerusalem Road,” said one young man, as he sat 
down near Lawrence and lighted a cigarette. "I 
vow I don’t know which is the better rider, your 
wife or Maxwell. They were talking of going over 
to Hull. They challenged me to come along, but I 
thought of the fifteen miles back here.” 

Presently the young man went in to dinner. 
Lawrence still kept his seat, though the wind had 
come up east with the turn of the tide towards the 
flood. He began to shiver, and at length rose to go 
and get an outside coat. He returned immediately 
with the coat buttoned closely about him. 

It was not until near ten o’clock that he really 


28 o 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


began to wonder why Prudence did not return ; and 
even then he was aware that this hour was not late, 
and particularly it was not late in these long summer 
days, when it seemed to be still day until far into the 
evening. 

There was a dance in the parlors, and Lawrence 
tried to watch the dancers from his place on the 
veranda. When another hour, and yet another, had 
gone, and the clocks had struck twelve, the man’s 
heart began to burn within him. It seemed to him 
also that one spot, on the top of his head, was on 
fire. But he was no longer conscious of being weak 
and ill. He believed he had never felt stronger in 
his life. He ran up the stairs to his room ; but 
when he had arrived there he forgot what it was he 
had come for. He thought he said, “That cursed 
woman ! ” below his breath. 

He wished he could see Carolyn Ffolliott, — not 
see her to speak with her, of course, but just look in 
her face. Just to look in her face would strengthen 
and comfort him, he was sure. 

With this thought in his mind he left the hotel 
and walked away in the direction of Savin Hill. It 
was three miles there. 

He did not expect to see Carolyn at this time of 
night, but the walk would take up his mind, and he 


LEANDER AS A MEANS. 28 1 

was stronger than he had been since his illness. By 
the time he returned to the hotel perhaps Prudence 
and Lord Maxwell would be back. 

He had got over the ground rapidly. In a short 
time he had entered the side gate which opened into 
the vegetable garden. 

The brilliant starlight made it possible for him to 
see his way with sufficient clearness ; every yard of 
ground was familiar and dear to him. He passed on 
slowly along the dew-wet path until he came to a 
small space which was Carolyn’s flower-garden ; he 
knew she worked in this spot with her own hands, 
digging and weeding, and that she allowed here only 
her own especial favorites. 

He stood a moment here. He could not distin- 
guish the different plants, but the warm night air 
brought out heavily the perfume of heliotrope and 
mignonette. Carolyn used to be in the habit of 
wearing every day a little bunch of these flowers. 
But then that time was a thousand years ago. 

Lawrence stepped carefully into the garden and 
peered about until he found and gathered a sprig 
of each of these flowers. Holding them in his hand, 
he went towards the house. 

As he saw a light in the room that he knew was 
“Aunt Tishy’s,” he began to fear that some one 


282 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


might be out in the grounds this lovely evening, 
and come upon him. That would be a very awk- 
ward meeting for him. But if he could happen to 
see Carolyn — 

He walked on slowly. The turreted house towered 
up blackly. He heard Mrs. Ffolliott’s little terrier 
barking somewhere within the building. He leaned 
against a tree that stood on the edge of the lawn. 
He felt like an outcast. Where were all his dreams 
of usefulness and happiness ? He had an idea that 
he had been considered what is called “ a promising 
young man.” And he had really meant to do some- 
thing. He smiled forlornly and tried to rouse him- 
self. He thought that his musing was like the 
musing of an old man. What an inconceivable 
act of folly he had committed ! 

He shook his shoulders impatiently. He turned, 
thinking to retrace his steps to his hotel. Perhaps 
Prudence had returned by this time. 

Was it possible that Carolyn was going to marry 
Lord Maxwell ? And was that one reason why Pru- 
dence was so excessively kind to the Englishman now ? 
His mind went galloping from one subject to another. 

Something moved in the tree above him. He 
raised his head and looked up into the darkness of 
the leaves. 


LEANDER AS A MEANS. 283 

" There are some birds there,” he said, idly. 

The sound was made again, and now Lawrence 
started quickly as something fluttered down to the 
ground near him. He could only dimly see a dark 
object which hopped close to his feet, making a little 
rasping noise as it did so. 

Lawrence stooped quickly and lifted Devil in his 
hand. The crow’s feet clung about his fingers, 
and the bird made his chuckling, strange sound 
and pecked blindly at the hand that held him. 

Lawrence knew that he was unreasonably startled 
at the presence of Devil. He walked forward quickly 
along the gravel path, not noticing that he was on 
the way that led from the house. 

Had Prudence returned, or had the bird decided 
that he would himself come home ? It was not 
strange that the crow had flown to Savin Hill. 
Leander, who sometimes rode his bicycle to the 
hotel, had given the information that Devil was 
frequently at his old home. 

Lawrence began to hurry. He would go back to 
the hotel. It had been very foolish of him to come 
thus far. And suddenly he was conscious of being 
tired ; but he did not slacken his pace. 

All at once he became aware that there were steps 
behind him, steps running. 


284 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

He drew back quickly into the shrubbery. Were 
there other prowlers besides himself in the Ffolliott 
grounds to-night ? He hoped that he should not be 
seen. 

The next moment he saw that it was a woman 
coming, and the next he was sure it was Carolyn. 

She must be in trouble ; something must have 
happened. 

She seemed to fly by him, so fast she went. He 
heard her panting. 

He stepped from the shrubbery after she had 
passed. His only thought was to help her. 

“ Carolyn ! ” he called. 

She stopped short. 

He hastened up to her. 

“ Carolyn ! ” he said, again. 

She drew back a step. “ What ! You ? ” she 
said, in a half whisper. 

“ Yes. What is the matter ? Oh, do let me help 
you ! ” 

She came nearer now, as if in time of trouble 
she would naturally draw near to him. Then she 
started back and began to fly on again. But she cried 
in answer, “ Lee is dreadfully ill. I’m going to send 
Jack on the black horse to the village for a doctor.” 

The words came distinctly to him as he hurried 


LEANDER AS A MEANS. 


285 


on after her. When he had taken in the meaning of 
her reply he stopped in the walk. There was the 
stable close by, and the man Jack slept in a room of 
the building. 

Lawrence stood a moment undecided. Ought he 
to go away ? 

No; surely it was proper for him to stay and 
know how it was with the boy. And this used to 
be like a home to Lawrence. It was terrible for 
him to feel that it was home no longer. All the 
old and natural sense of protective tenderness 
towards this household sprang into full life again. 

He hastened to the house, pausing at the side 
door to which he knew Carolyn would return ; and 
indeed he found this door opened, and a light burning 
in the room close by. He stood here listening. All 
the time the crow had remained securely perched on 
his hand. It now flew up on his shoulder. 

Presently he heard the sound of a horse’s hoofs 
going rapidly along the road to the village. Then 
the light, quick footfall on the walk again, and 
Carolyn came up to the door. 

Lawrence moved aside. The girl just glanced at 
him, as she hurried forward. 

“ Only let me wait here until you can let me know 
how he is,” said Lawrence, quickly. 


286 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


'‘Come in,” she said, hastily. “You must not 
stay outside.” 

Carolyn passed on into another room, and then he 
heard her go up the stairs. The young man was so 
well acquainted with the house that he could locate 
every sound. 

After a few moments of waiting, Lawrence grew 
uncontrollably anxious. Sometimes, when a door 
opened, he could hear the high, sharp tones of 
Leander, tones that revealed that the boy was not 
in his right mind ; sometimes the tones rose to a 
furious shout. 

At last Lawrence could bear it no longer. He 
pulled the crow from his shoulder, and put it down 
in a chair. Then he ran up the stairs, forgetting 
that he was not as strong as usual. He entered 
Leander’s room just as the boy was trying to leap 
from his bed, and his mother and sister were 
struggling to keep him there. 

“ Oh, Rodney ! help us ! ” cried Mrs. Ffolliott, 
breathlessly. 

Lawrence walked forward and put the two women 
aside. He held out his arms ; Leander sprang into 
them, nearly throttling him in the violence of his 
embrace. 

But Lawrence could not sustain the burden for 


LEANDER AS A MEANS . 


287 


more than a moment. He turned to find a seat, 
then he sank down on the bed, holding the boy fast 
all the time. 

Mrs. Ffolliott was wringing her hands and crying, 
“ Oh, what shall I do ! Oh, what shall I do ! ” 

But Carolyn was standing straight and still, her 
eyes on Lawrence, watching to discover if there was 
any way for her to help. 

Leander’s eyes were wildly dilated ; his limbs 
seemed to have a convulsive movement. 

“ Let us try a hot bath,” said Lawrence. 

Then Carolyn flew to prepare it. Meanwhile 
Lawrence sat on the bed, the boy’s arms fast about 
his neck, the mother walking frantically here and 
there in the room. Every few moments she ex- 
claimed, “ Will the doctor never come ? ” 

But Lawrence did not say anything. His heart 
was heavy within him. To this mother the world 
itself seemed to circle about simply that her son 
might live upon it. 

Carolyn came back to say that the bath would 
soon be ready. She went to her mother and put her 
arm about her. “Let us be as brave as we can,” 
she whispered ; and she kissed her mother’s cheek. 

The time dragged in that deadly way which so 
many of us know. 


288 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


Lawrence did not rise. He sat rigidly still, hold- 
ing Leander. He looked at Carolyn, whose face 
suddenly blanched still more. She turned to her 
mother. 

“ Please see if the water is just right, mamma; 
you’ll find Jane there.” 

Mrs. Ffolliott went out of the room. 

“ Carolyn,” said Lawrence, in a voice just above a 
whisper. 

The girl came slowly to the bed. 


CHAPTER XIX. 

“I SHALL COME BACK.” 

“ Dear Caro,” said Lawrence, in the same whis- 
per, “ can you bear it ? ” 

The girl sank on her knees by the bed. She 
reached up, and caught hold of Lawrence’s arm ; 
she clung to it. 

“ No, no ! ” she cried, in a half voice ; “ it can’t 
be ! Let us try the bath ! Let us try everything ! 
The dear little brother ! I will not have it so ! ” 

She rose as quickly as she had knelt. She en- 
deavored to take the boy from the arms that held 
him. 

“ I will carry him,” said Lawrence, rising. He 
had no hope, but he walked steadily to the bath- 
room. He helped the mother put the rigid form 
in the hot water. 

The next moment he uttered a quick exclamation 
below his breath. 

Had a faint flush come to the white little face ? 

289 


290 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY \ 


The mother bent over her son. She rubbed his 
limbs ; she pressed her cheek- to his ; she seemed 
almost to breathe her own breath into him. 

Carolyn stood leaning against the door-frame. She 
could do nothing more; she could only wait, her 
pulses beating in her throat and threatening to 
choke her. 

Suddenly Lawrence stood upright. “ Thank God ! ” 
he breathed. He turned to Carolyn and took her 
hand, holding it firmly. They did not speak ; they 
stood there hand in hand. 

It had all happened so quickly to him, the terror, 
the relief, that now it still seemed as if he had not 
come to Savin Hill, as if he must be in his own 
room at the hotel, and dreaming all this. 

But the touch of that soft, tender, and strong 
hand, — was not that real ? And now the hand was 
withdrawn. 

“ Hullo, Rodney ! That you ? ” A small, piping 
voice from the bath-tub thus spoke. 

“ Run and get another blanket,” said Mrs. 
Ffolliott. 

In another moment the blanket was tightly 
wrapped about the boy in his dripping night- 
gown, and Rodney had taken him again in his 
arms. Thus the procession started back to the 


“/ SHALL COME BA CK. ” 29 1 

chamber they had just left. Mrs. Ffolliott was 
now weeping aloud and as unrestrainedly as a 
child. 

“ What’s the row, anyway ? ” asked a weak voice 
from Lawrence’s shoulder. 

“Wait,” said Carolyn from behind. 

“I won’t wait, either,” said the boy, feebly, but 
quite in character. “Tell me now.” 

“You’ve been ill.” 

“ Have I ? I feel kinder queer, I do believe.” 

A silence followed, and continued until the boy 
had been invested with a dry night-robe and covered 
in bed. 

“ I don’t want Rod to go,” he now announced. 
“I want Rod to lie down on this bed.” 

“ Rodney, you must,” said Mrs. Ffolliott. 

“ But, mamma, it may not be convenient — ” be- 
gan Carolyn. 

“ I want Rod ! ” 

There were indications that the small legs under 
the bed-cover were about to kick with what strength 
they had. 

“I’ll stay,” said Lawrence. 

So it came about that he did not go back to the 
hotel that night, and that the crow spent the re- 
mainder of the time until morning on the same chair 


292 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

where his master had placed him in one of the lower 
rooms at Savin Hill. 

The doctor came and spoke vaguely of “ convulsive 
seizure,” said nothing could have been better than a 
warm bath, left some medicine, and drove away. 

Lawrence kept his promise to the boy, and passed 
the night on the bed by Leander’s side. 

In the early morning he rose. The boy was 
asleep, but it was evident that he would be ill, — how 
ill could not yet be told. 

Weary, indescribably depressed, the young man 
went slowly down the stairs. 

A servant had apparently been watching for him, 
for a tray with hot coffee and bread and butter was 
immediately brought to him. Having eaten and 
drunk, a spark of courage seemed to come to his 
consciousness. 

He looked out of the window. An east fog had 
risen in the early morning, and all the world was a 
dense mist. He could hear the low booming of the 
sea against the shore. 

Do you think he thought of Carolyn as those in 
battle think of peace, as those in despair think of 
that time when they may hope ? 

He turned from the window and went to the room 
where he had left Devil. He would take the crow 


/ SHALL COME BACK. 


293 


and go back to his own life again. He shivered 
uncontrollably. 

The house was utterly still. A clock struck six. 
Mrs. Ffolliott was with her son. 

Yes, there was the crow, looking as if it had not 
stirred all night. But it moved now as its master 
approached, raised itself, and turned its head that it 
might gaze at him with one eye. It lifted its 
wings also, and stretched out one leg, gaping as it 
did so. 

The man’s pulses gave a great start, and he sprang 
forward, seized the bird, and found a small roll of 
thin paper fastened to its wing. 

“ So you are a carrier-dove,” he said, harshly. 

He took the paper to the window and unfolded it 
with hands that trembled in spite of all his efforts to 
make them firm. 

Yes, there was his wife’s handwriting, close, up- 
right, regular ; her hand had not trembled when she 
had penned these lines. 

Lawrence’s lips set themselves hardly under his 
mustache, as his eyes, beneath heavily frowning 
brows, glanced at the first words. These words were 
“ My dear Rodney.” 

Having read thus much, Lawrence turned and 
pulled a chair up to the window. Then he looked at 


294 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

the door ; what if some one should come in ? It not 
being his own room he could not turn the key. He 
felt as if he were on the brink of a precipice and he 
must be alone that he might gaze over the edge of it 
unhindered. 

Was it possible that he hated the woman who had 
written this ? And now had she disgraced him ? 

He walked out of the room with the letter held 
tightly in his hand. As he reached the outer door 
Mrs. Ffolliott’s voice called from above the stairs : 

“ Rodney ! You mustn’t go ! Lee may want you 
when he wakes.” 

“ I will come back,” he answered. 

“ Be sure ! Come right back.” 

Lawrence made an inarticulate sound in response, 
then he closed the outer door behind him and stood 
in the open air. 

He hastened beyond a thicket of syringa ; then, 
leaning against a tree, he opened the paper again. 


“ My dear Rodney : — It strikes me that Devil will be a 
remarkably fit messenger for the letter I’m going to write you. 
You see, I shall have it all written when I ride away this morn- 
ing, but I think it will be more appropriate to take it with me 
and let Devil deliver it. You’ll be sure to find it sooner or 
later. 

“ I’m going away with Lord Maxwell. I suppose you’ll 


I SHALL COME BACH. 


295 


think I’m the only one to blame in the affair, and perhaps I 
am. But no matter about that. You needn’t believe for a 
moment that I’m the least little bit in love with him, for I’m 
not. Who could love a man with a chin like his, and who 
was always telling you how jolly you are? No, I don’t love 
him, and I was intensely in love with you. I’ve made a fine 
plan, I think. This is it : I go off with Donald — that’s Lord 
Maxwell, you know. That makes a kind of scandal, to be 
sure, but it will soon blow over. I’m so deadly tired and 
deadly dull being with you, and you’re so deadly tired 
and deadly dull being with me, that I, for one, think almost 
anything would be better than our staying together. You’ll be 
able to get a divorce without the slightest trouble ; and I’ll get 
my freedom, too. Then we can change partners, as if the 
dance were over, and we glad enough that it is over. Mar- 
riage need not be such a hard and fast affair, for there’s noth- 
ing in the world that people make such mistakes about as they 
do about marriage. Now, why not ‘ all change hands,’ as 
they used to do in the old dances ? 

“ I’m going to be very frank with you, Rodney. I’ll confess 
that I might not take such a decided step as this if I were not 
afraid Maxwell would marry Carolyn. The dear girl ! she has 
already refused him once, so he tells me ; but what does one 
refusal mean? Just nothing at all; though it might with 
Carolyn. But I don’t want to risk that. They say the third 
time never fails, and I shall be Lady Maxwell sooner or later. 
Of course I shall be under a cloud for awhile, but I’m not 
afraid but that I can win my way. And Donald is perfectly 
infatuated with me. That goes without saying. This time no 
brewer’s daughter will step between us. How I am going on ! 
But I wanted you to understand the whole thing. I hope you 
won’t delay any about the divorce. Of course I know you love 


296 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY . i 


Carolyn ; of course I know you’ll thank me in time for what 
I’m doing. Why didn’t I wait and try the incompatibility 
plea? Because Maxwell might marry Carolyn, and then you’d 
be as disappointed as I. So I’m sure, on the whole, you’ll 
agree with me. And for the sake of regaining your freedom 
you’ll forgive me for the scandal I make by doing this way. 
I’m sorry this way seemed to be necessary, for I don’t mind 
saying I shrink from it. Now, my dear Rodney, don’t swear ; 
you’ll live to thank me.” 

Thus the letter ended, without even a name signed 
to it. 

“But it doesn’t need a name,” Lawrence said. 
He stood there and read the pages three times, each 
reading seeming to shed a still brighter glare on the 
character of the writer. 

“ That is the woman I married,” he was thinking. 
“ That woman ! ” 

He turned about and faced the house, the turrets 
of which he could see above the trees, blurred in 
the mist. He walked out from among the syringas, 
walking unevenly, like a man who is drunk. 

Above, in her chamber, Carolyn saw him. She 
was standing by the open window. She leaned 
forward and watched him, her tired eyes dilating 
as she watched. After a moment she left the room 
and ran quickly down the stairs and out of the 
house. 


“ I SHALL COME BACK” 297 

Suddenly, as Lawrence went staggering on, a 
slender shape glided up to him and drew his hand 
quickly within an arm. 

“ Rodney, lean on me,” said Carolyn, in an un- 
steady voice. “ Oh, how ill you are ! Here, sit on 
this bench. I will go and get some one to help 
you.” 

Lawrence sank down on the bench, but he caught 
at the girl’s skirt, saying, breathlessly : 

“ Stay ! Stay ! Read this.” 

The letter fluttered out towards her. She stopped, 
standing perfectly still. She recognized her cousin’s 
writing, and her eyes darted over the lines, not read- 
ing much, but taking in, as by a flash of lurid light, 
the whole sense of the base epistle. She did not 
speak, but stood gazing down at the letter after she 
had ceased to read it. She did not wish to look in 
her companion’s face ; she felt that she could not. 
Her own cheeks were hot with humiliated indigna- 
tion. 

Lawrence had leaned his elbows on his knees and 
covered his face with his hands. He was not think- 
ing ; he was not even feeling. A dull sensation of 
sinking down — down, he knew not where, was all 
that he was conscious of. Then some keen stab, as 
if from a hot knife, went through him. He started 


298 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

up, turning his face towards Carolyn. He flung out 
his hands as if he were groping blindly. 

“ Oh, Caro, my love ! ” he cried, not knowing 
what he said. 

Then he fell forward on the ground at her feet. 

The climax of illness and anxiety and unhappi- 
ness seemed to have been reached. The inanimate 
body was taken to the room which had always been 
Lawrence’s, and put upon his old bed. 

Then followed days and weeks of illness, during 
which the man was sometimes delirious, sometimes 
lying in a stupor. 

A nurse and Mrs. Ffolliott and Carolyn watched 
over him. 

At last, when summer had waned towards its end, 
and there were already hints of the autumn glories, 
Lawrence opened his eyes and saw Mrs. Ffolliott 
sitting by him. 

“ Is it a good while ? ” he asked, feebly. 

She bent over him. “ A few weeks.” 

“ And Lee?” 

“ He’s all right. Don’t talk.” 

“No. I can’t.” 

Then, in a moment, “Aunt Tishy, I’m going to 
die, and I’m glad of it.” 

“ No, no ! ” 


“/ SHALL COME BACH. 299 

“ Yes, I am. And I want you to tell Caro that I 
love her, — love her — ” 

He closed his eyes ; he spoke dreamily, then was 
silent. 

But he did not die. He began to gain steadily, 
and he often remarked that it was a great mistake ; 
then was the time for him to die. 

Carolyn came no more to his room. Sometimes 
he heard her voice when a door opened, or he could 
hear her singing far off somewhere. 

Frequently the crow was allowed to come to the 
chamber, where he would gravely amuse himself by 
hopping over the floor, occasionally picking at some- 
thing ; or he would sit on the top of a chair and look 
at the man on the bed. 

At last Lawrence could go down-stairs and sit in 
the sun on the lawn, the shadow of a man, his long, 
bony frame stretched out, his gaunt face and great 
eyes turned towards the shining blue water. 

Every day he told himself that perhaps the next 
day he could go away. He was longing to work ; he 
felt the springs of life and strength slowly rising 
within him. Happiness was not for him, but there 
was work. 

One day Mrs. Ffolliott came across the grass and 
sat down beside him. Indeed, she often did this, 


300 


FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 


but he thought there was something special in her 
manner just now. 

“ You’re getting very much stronger and better, 
aren’t you, Rodney ? ” she asked. 

“ Oh, yes ; I shall soon be all right,” was the 
reply. “And I shall go away as soon as I can. 
How good you’ve been to me ! ” 

“ Don’t mention such a thing. Rodney — ” 

The speaker paused. She looked uneasily about 
her. 

“ Caro says it’s time you were told,” she went on, 
and then stopped again. 

Lawrence sat up erect. He began to brace him- 
self for he knew not what. 

“You might hear it from some one else, now — ” 

“ Hear what ? ” in an imperative voice. 

Mrs. Ffolliott twisted her fingers together. But 
she tried to go on. 

“That day when Prudence went bicycling with 
Lord Maxwell — ” 

“Yes, I have her letter; I know all about it,” he 
said, in a hard voice. “ Don’t be afraid to speak of it.” 

“ No, you don’t know. Oh, how can I tell it ? 
She was killed. They were run into ; she was 
thrown on to a rock, — killed instantly. Lord Max- 
well was badly hurt, but is nearly recovered. We 


/ SHALL COME BACK. 


301 


couldn’t tell you before. We knew it the next day. 
Oh, the dreadful, dreadful thing ! ” 

Mrs. Ffolliott had risen. “ Oh, don’t look so ! ” 
she cried. 

“ Aunt Tishy, please leave me a few minutes.” 

She could hardly hear what he said, but she did 
hear it, and walked away. 

She looked back and saw him leaning forward in 
the old attitude, with his hands over his face. 

Up-stairs Caro saw him also. Her own face was 
ashen. She left the window and sat down. 

He was still sitting thus when Mrs. Ffolliott went 
back to him. She put her hand on his shoulder. 

“ Rodney,” she said, “ I must remind you that no 
one knows what — what there was in her letter, — 
that they were going away together, — only Lord 
Maxwell, and you, and I, and Caro. You see, 
there’ll be no scandal.” 

“ And she is dead. Now I am going to leave you, 
really.” 

It was three days later that Lawrence announced 
that he was going, and he would not yield to re- 
monstrances and assertions that he was not well 
enough. 

He saw Caro alone when he bade her good-by : 
he had asked to see her alone. 


302 FRIENDSHIP AND FOLLY. 

“Lee is going to keep Devil,” he said. “The 
boy wanted him.” 

Caro was in the embrasure of a window, leaning 
against it. She made a silent motion of assent. 

Lawrence walked about the room. 

“ I’m going to try to make something of my life,” 
he went on. 

He came and stood a moment before the girl. He 
took both her hands. But all he said was : 

“Caro, I shall come back.” 


THE END. 


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scenes through which the hero and his companions of both 
sexes are made to pass, and many will yield ungrudging praise 
to the author’s vital handling of the truth. In the characters 
are mirrored the life of the Italy of their day. The book will 
confirm Mr. Maugham’s reputation as a strong and original 
writer. 


Omar the Tentmaker. 

A Romance of Old Persia. By Nathan Haskell 
Dole. Illustrated by F. T. Merrill. 

1 vol., library 12 mo, cloth . . . . $1.50 

Mr. Dole’s study of Persian literature and history admirably 
equips him to enter into the life and spirit of the time of the 
romance, and the hosts of admirers of the inimitable quatrains 
of Omar Khayyam, made famous by Fitzgerald, will be deeply 
interested in a tale based on authentic facts in the career of the 
famous Persian poet. The three chief characters are Omar 
Khayyam, Nizam-ul-Mulk, the generous and high-minded Vizier 
of the Tartar Sultan Malik Shah of Mero, and Hassan ibu 
Sabbah, the ambitious and revengeful founder of the sect of 
the Assassins. The scene is laid partly at Naishapur, in the 
Province of Khorasan, which about the period of the First 
Crusade was at its acme of civilization and refinement, and 
partly in the mountain fortress of Alamut, south of the Cas- 
pian Sea, where the Ismailians under Hassan established them- 
selves towards the close of the nth century. Human nature is 
always the same, and the passions of love and ambition, of 
religion and fanaticism, of friendship and jealousy, are admira- 
bly contrasted in the fortunes of these three able and remark- 
able characters as well as in those of the minor personages of 
the story. 


6 


L. C. PAGE AND COMPANY^ 


Captain Fracasse. 

A new translation from the French by Gautier. 
Illustrated by Victor A. Searles. 
i vol., library 12 mo, cloth .... $1.25 

This famous romance has been out of print for some time, 
and a new translation is sure to appeal to its many admirers, 
who have never yet had any edition worthy of the story. 

The Rejuvenation of Hiss Semaphore. 

A farcical novel. By Hal Godfrey. Illustrated 
by Etheldred B. Barry. 

1 vol., library 12 mo, cloth . . . . $1.25 

A fanciful, laughable tale of two maiden sisters of uncertain 
age who are induced, by their natural longing for a return to 
youth and its blessings, to pay a large sum for a mystical water 
which possesses the value of setting backwards the hands of 
time. No more delightfully fresh and original book has ap- 
peared since “ Vice Versa” charmed an amused world. It is 
well written, drawn to the life, and full of the most enjoy- 
able humor. 

Midst the Wild Carpathians. 

By Maurus Jokai, author of “ Black Diamonds,” 
“The Lion of Janina,” etc. Authorized translation 
by R. Nisbet Bain. Illustrated by J. W. Kennedy. 

1 vol., library 12 mo, cloth .... $1.25 

A thrilling, historical, Hungarian novel, in which the extraor- 
dinary dramatic and descriptive powers of the great Magyar 
writer have full play. As a picture of feudal life in Hungary it 
has never been surpassed for fidelity and vividness. The trans- 
lation is exceedingly well done. 

The Golden Dog. 

A Romance of Quebec. By William Kirby. New 
authorized edition. Illustrated by J. W. Kennedy. 
1 vol., library 12 mo, cloth . . . . $1.25 

A powerful romance of love, intrigue, and adventure in the 
time of Louis XV. and Mme. de Pompadour, when the French 
cqlonies were making their great struggle t<j.\retain for an un- 
grateful court the fairest jewels in the colonial diadem of 
France. 


LIST OF NEW FICTION. 


7 


Bijli the Dancer. 

By James Blythe Patton. Illustrated by Horace 
Van Rinth. 

i vol., library i2mo, cloth .... $1.50 

A novel of Modem India. The fortunes of the heroine, 
an Indian Naucht girl, are told with a vigor, pathos, and a 
wealth of poetic sympathy that makes the book admirable from 
first to last. 

“To Arms ! ” 

Being Some Passages from the Early Life of Allan 
Oliphant, Chirurgeon, Written by Himself, and now 
Set Forth for the First Time. By Andrew Balfour. 
Illustrated by F. W. Glover. 

1 vol., library i2mo, cloth .... $1.50 

A romance dealing with an interesting phase of Scottish and 
English history, the Jacobite Insurrection of 1715, which will 
appeal strongly to the great number of admirers of historical 
fiction. The story is splendidly told, the magic circle which 
the author draws about the reader compelling a complete 
forgetfulness of prosaic nineteenth century life. 

Friendship and Folly. 

A novel. By Maria Louise Poole, author of “ In a 
Dike Shanty,” etc. Illustrated by J. W. Kennedy. 

1 vol., library 12 mo, cloth .... $1.25 

An extremely well-written story of modern life. The interest 
centres in the development of the character of the heroine, a 
New England girl, whose high-strung temperament is in con- 
stant revolt against the confining limitations of nineteenth 
century surroundings. The reader’s interest is held to the end, 
and the book will take high rank among American psychologi- 
cal novels. 

A Hypocritical Romance and other 
stories. 

By Caroline Ticknor. Illustrated by J. W. Ken- 
nedy. 1 vol., large i6mo, cloth . . $1.00 

Miss Ticknor, well known as one of the most promising of 
the younger school of American writers, has never done better 
work than in the majority of these clever stories, written in a 
delightful comedy vein. 


8 


L. C. PAGE AND COMPANY'S 


Cross Trails. 

By Victor Waite. Illustrated by J. W. Kennedy, 
i vol., library 12 mo, cloth .... $1.50 

A Spanish-American novel of unusual interest, a brilliant, 
dashing, and stirring story, teeming with humanity and life. 
Mr. Waite is to be congratulated upon the strength with which 
he has drawn his characters. 

A Mad Madonna and other stories. 

By L. Clarkson Whitelock, with eight half-tone 
illustrations. 1 vol., large i6mo, cloth . $1.00 

A half dozen remarkable psychological stories, delicate in 
color and conception. Each of the six has a touch of the super- 
natural, a quick suggestion, a vivid intensity, and a dreamy 
realism that is matchless in its forceful execution. 

On the Point. 

A Summer Idyl. By Nathan Haskell Dole, au- 
thor of “ Not Angels Quite,” with dainty half-tone 
illustrations as chapter headings. 

1 vol., large i6mo, cloth .... $1.00 

A bright and clever story of a summer on the coast of Maine, 
fresh, breezy, and readable from the first to the last page. 
The narrative describes the summer outing of a Mr. Merrithew 
and his family. The characters are all honest, pleasant people, 
whom we are glad to know. We part from them with the 
same regret with which we leave a congenial party of friends. 

Cavalleria Rusticana; or. Under the 
Shadow of Etna. 

Translated from the Italian of Giovanni Verga, by 
Nathan Haskell Dole. Illustrated by Etheldred 
B. Barry. 1 vol., i6mo, cloth . . . $0.50 

Giovanni Verga stands at present as unquestionably the 
most prominent of the Italian novelists. His supremacy in 
the domain of the short story and in the wider range of the 
romance is recognized both at home and abroad. The present 
volume contains a selection from the most dramatic and char- 
acteristic of his Sicilian tales. Verga is himself a native of 
Sicily, and his knowledge of that wonderful country, with its 
poetic and yet superstitious peasantry, is absolute. Such 
pathos, humor, variety, and dramatic quality are rarely met 
in a single volume. 





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